San Francisco based blockchain company Ripple has secured another major banking partner in Asia this week. ASEAN’s fifth largest bank, CIMB Group, as announced that it will join RippleNet in order to utilize the firm’s cross border transfer products. Its XRP token meanwhile has held on to second spot over Ethereum.

RippleNet Expands it Reach

The move will allow the bank to grow its global payments network by joining those already in the Ripple network. According to the announcement CIMB is one of the first banks in Asia to leverage blockchain technology. In a region where micro-payments and remittances drive the bulk of banking transactions, the need for more efficiency and cost reduction has never been greater.

According to the World Bank, remittances in the region will grow to $120 billion this year. The Boston Consulting Group added that the global cross border payment volume is an estimated $27 trillion with a further $20 trillion expected to be added in the coming decade. The ASEAN region is responsible for almost 40% of this entire volume.

CIMB already has its own remittance platform called SpeedSend so the partnership with Ripple is designed to enhance that and further improve the speed and costs of cross border payments. CIMB Group chief executive, Tengku Dato’ Sri Zafrul Aziz said;

“We are delighted to be part of RippleNet and look forward to a fruitful partnership with Ripple by leveraging each other’s strengths and capabilities. This innovative blockchain solution will revolutionize international cross-border remittances, and is a testament to CIMB’s ongoing efforts to enhance its digital banking proposition …”

Ripple boss, Brad Garlinghouse, commented “CIMB’s network already spans 15 countries, nearly 800 branches and offers Speedsend — one of the best solutions in the ASEAN region. Now, by integrating Ripple’s blockchain technology, they will enable their customers to send vital funds to family, friends and loved ones more efficiently.”

XRP Holds Second Spot, Accelerates Away From Ethereum

Ripple always maintains that the company and token are not connected but what happens to one will obviously have an effect on the performance of the other so this sentiment can be refuted. Besides, the company still holds a very large slice of the XRP pie. In the aftermath of crypto market’s largest crash of the year, XRP emerged above Ethereum, taking second place in the market cap charts.

When this has happened previously, Ethereum recovered quickly and retook its spot. This time, however, that recovery has not occurred and XRP has made better gains keeping it above ETH. At the time of writing XRP is up almost 5% on the day whereas Ethereum has only made just over 1%. As a result XRP’s market capitalization has increased to $19.3 billion whereas Ethereum’s is now $18.6, widening the gap since yesterday when they were only $200k apart.

If there is no further momentum for Ethereum it may have to settle for being the world’s third largest cryptocurrency as XRP moves ahead of it.