Ripple just scored two major institutional wins but XRP traders are bracing for a bigger move

On Aug. 18, Ripple deepened its push into traditional finance, securing a South Korean banking deal as its prime brokerage raised $275 million.The crypto payment company revealed that South Korea's Jeonbuk Bank became the country's first regional lender to deploy Ripple Payments for cross-border business transfers, replacing SWIFT-based correspondent-bank transfers that can take days to reach recipients.Hours later, Ripple Prime closed an upsized $275 million private placement of senior unsecured notes to support its expanding US business.Together, the announcements show Ripple pushing deeper into two parts of financial infrastructure: cross-border payments for banks and the clearing, financing and brokerage services used by institutional investors.Korea becomes a multi-product foothold for RippleJeonbuk adds payments to a Korean expansion that already reaches digital-asset custody and tokenized securities.The bank will use Ripple Payments to provide near real-time, around-the-clock settlement for customers including import-export companies, technology startups and online content creators. Ripple said the service can complete transfers in seconds to minutes, compared with cross-bor...