For months, XRP influencers on X and YouTube have been promising their followers that American Specific (AmEx) was about to embrace XRP. The lengthy–awaited announcement lastly arrived on March 30.
Seems, the NFL sponsorship take care of the bank card big had nothing to do with XRP. Yesterday, AmEx turned the Official Funds Companion of the NFL, i.e., for presale tickets, on-site experiences, and sport perks.
Not a single point out of Ripple or its blockchain.
The hype had been constructing for months and reached a crescendo within the hours earlier than the announcement.
The identical false promise has resurged in viral waves for years.
A years-long sample of recycled hype
XRP influencers have forecasted AmEx’s use of the XRP Ledger (XRPL) an embarrassing variety of instances.
Months and even years in the past, influencers claimed it was “a done deal” with AmEx, attaching diagrams, convention movies, audio clips, and assortments of annotated screenshots.
In January 2025, a frontrunner of the XRP Military advised his followers that Garlinghouse had revealed a partnership with AmEx below a non-disclosure settlement.
In March 2025, one other influencer posted that AmEx had confirmed manufacturing a crypto card with Ripple.
By July 2025, one more XRP influencer cited an unattributed infographic claiming AmEx someway makes use of XRPL.
The American Specific announcement has nothing to do with XRP.
It is an NFL partnership.
Block each influencer who advised you this will likely be about XRP and bought you hopium ❤️. https://t.co/ANVemhnzpu
— Vet (@Vet_X0) March 30, 2026
What really occurred in 2017
The complete mythology traces again to 1 actual occasion. In November 2017, AmEx and Ripple introduced a pilot for cross-border enterprise funds between the US and UK by way of RippleNet.
Critically, that pilot didn’t use the XRP coin. Ripple’s personal government advised CNBC on the time, “The technology we have developed, it separated a connection from the cryptocurrency or the token.”
AmEx may use Ripple to change worth from one fiat foreign money to a different, he defined, “without the need for any intermediate blockchain currency.” Treacher added that XRP “will come into play later on in the evolutionary dynamics and the other players.”
It by no means did. AmEx by no means expanded the pilot, adopted XRP, or pursued any take care of Ripple past 2017. AmEx has by no means confirmed any new XRP deal, and the more moderen viral claims have been labeled pretend and deceptive.
Nonetheless, the AmEx rumor gained its inception then, and XRP influencers saved recycling it for years.
The XRP engagement financial system of nonexistent partnerships
XRP influencers have turned the hole between RippleNet partnerships and precise XRPL utilization right into a cottage trade.
The sample is constant. Influencers cite particulars a few years-old blockchain pilot, conflate RippleNet with XRP token utilization, add ‘breaking’ or ‘just in’ or emergency siren emojis, and acquire easy engagement on social media.
Worse, some posts promoted unrelated tokens alongside the AmEx fiction. One Binance Sq. person bundled the pretend announcement with a promotion for an unrelated token that might allegedly profit from the non-existent AmEx-XRPL deal.
Protos has beforehand documented tons of of Ripple partnership bulletins that generated minimal utilization of XRP, from MoneyGram to Bhutan’s central financial institution.
XRP is down 29% 12 months up to now. AmEx, in the meantime, is promoting soccer tickets utilizing common {dollars}.
