Ripple’s David Schwartz: Being CTO Is Pretty Wild

In a recent tweet, Ripple CTO David Schwartz revealed something about his role at Ripple that he rarely ever talks about.

Schwartz, alongside the duo of Jed McCaleb and Arthur Britto, began developing XRP Ledger (XRPL) in 2011. Fascinated by Bitcoin, they set out to create a better version that improved upon its limitations with the goal of creating a digital asset that was more sustainable and built specifically for payments. XRP Ledger was launched the following year, in mid 2012.

As a primary architect of XRP Ledger, Schwartz has overseen fundamental innovations in payment networks and blockchain-based financial infrastructure and became Ripple CTO in 2018.

In late September, Schwartz revealed that the time had come for him to step back from his day-to-day duties as Ripple CTO at the end of this year, and as CTO Emeritus, he would still be in and out of the Ripple office.

In Schwartz’s seven year journey as being the Ripple CTO, he reveals an aspect of his job not mostly aware to the public.

Being CTO pretty wild?

In a tweet, Schwartz wrote: “Being a CTO is pretty wild because half the time I look like this and half the time I look like my pinned tweet.”

Schwartz accompanied the tweet with an image of himself being dressed in a suit, this is compared to a casual look in his pinned tweet. The statement is obviously a playful one, and suggests a two-sided approach to his role as Ripple CTO: a casual and an official one.

The tweet caught the attention of the XRP community, with an X user speculating that there might be a deeper message to the Ripple CTO’s tweet. Schwartz waved aside this speculation, saying he was just being himself and nothing more.

While Schwartz indicated he would be stepping away from his day-to-day duties as Ripple CTO by the end of the year, he said he will not be going away from the XRP community.

As his last task at Ripple, Schwartz joined Ripple’s Board of Directors to continue supporting the company’s mission and long-term vision. He also joined Evernorth as a strategic advisor.