Bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchange LakeBTC.com has announced that they will be adding payment network Ripple’s native asset and cryptocurrency XRP.

Founded in 2013, LakeBTC is currently owned by Lake Investments Limited (BVI), with Shanghai Trading IT, Inc. providing technical and customer support.

The company told CryptoNinjas that XRP will be listed later this year simply to offer LakeBTC users more choices. Lake Investments recently announced an ICO for LankBanker, a spin-off from LakeBTC, which is developing a P2P based crowd banking platform.

As a leading exchange, LakeBTC provides liquidity to individual investors, institutions, merchants, miners, exchangers, market makers, arbitrageurs, funds, and professional trading firms.

Ripple’s XRP has had a jump in price this year hitting a high around 0.38 USD. The company continues to develop its payment network for frictionless global payments with settlement in just seconds. Last week, Ripple opened up an office in Mumbai, India expanding its global reach.

R3 and Ripple Dispute

Ripple is currently fighting back a lawsuit from financial blockchain database consortium R3, which says in its lawsuit that in September 2016, the companies entered into an agreement, part of which gave R3 the option to purchase 5 billion XRP at an exercise price of $0.0085 between then and September 2019.

Ripple tried to cancel the agreement in June in emails from CEO Brad Garlinghouse to Ripple CEO David Rutter, R3, however, rejected the requests. With XRP soaring more than 4000% this year, trading now around $0.20 USD, this makes the options worth roughly $1 billion.

Ripple is asserting that R3 has yet to deliver on its end of the contract in which Ripple would benefit from R3’s banking partnerships, thus exercising the options wouldn’t be authorized.

A Ripple spokesperson wrote, “Our filing is straightforward — R3 misrepresented their ability and intent to deliver on their commitments. Given XRP’s 4000% increase over the course of the year, R3 suddenly wants to tap into the value of XRP, though the facts are clear that they did not earn any option based on our agreement.”