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Someone sends you RLUSD, Ripple’s dollar stablecoin, and the payment fails. Or your wallet asks you to “add a trust line” before you can receive anything but XRP. The request sounds like a security setting, and it appears at the moment when a scammer would most like you to click quickly.

This article explains what a trust line is, why the XRP Ledger requires one, and the one detail to check before you approve it: the issuer address.

The short answer

On the XRP Ledger, XRP can arrive in any funded account. Other tokens cannot. To hold a token such as RLUSD, your account must first opt in with a trust line to the account that issued it. Without that opt-in, the ledger rejects the payment. The issuer address on the trust line tells you which token you are actually opting into.

What a trust line is

The XRPL.org page on trust line tokens describes a trust line as a two-way relationship between two accounts for one currency code. Each side sets its own limit, and the default limit is 0. To receive a token, your side needs a limit above zero.

The page says this design exists so that you cannot cause someone else to hold a token they do not want. That protects you from unsolicited tokens landing in your account, and it protects issuers from being forced to track holders who never opted in.

An account creates a trust line by sending a transaction type called TrustSet with a nonzero limit. The XRPL.org page adds that some transactions, such as buying a token on the ledger’s built-in exchange, can create a trust line with default settings automatically.

Why XRP is different

The XRPL.org currency formats reference lists the differences. XRP has no issuer and cannot be frozen. A token is always issued by an XRP Ledger account, and its issuer can freeze balances. Tokens are tracked in trust lines, while XRP is tracked in the account itself.

That is why an XRP wallet that receives XRP needs no extra step, but the same wallet needs a trust line before it can hold RLUSD.

Why the issuer address matters more than the name

The same reference shows that a token amount is defined by three fields: the currency code, the value, and the issuer. The currency code is described as arbitrary. Nothing in that format ties a code to a brand name, so a code that looks like a familiar stablecoin on a screen is not proof of who issued it.

Ripple’s developer page, RLUSD on the XRP Ledger, lists the official mainnet issuer address for RLUSD:

rMxCKbEDwqr76QuheSUMdEGf4B9xJ8m5De

The same page gives the ledger’s underlying currency code for RLUSD as a 40-character code that begins 524C5553. Wallets usually display the readable name instead. Ripple also lists a separate testnet issuer. Testnet tokens have no value, and that address should never appear on a mainnet trust line.

Before you approve a trust line, compare the issuer address in your wallet with the address on Ripple’s page, character by character. Type the page address into your browser yourself or open it from Ripple’s official documentation. Do not rely on a link or an address that someone sent you in a message.

You can also look up the issuer account on the XRP Ledger explorer. Ripple links to it from the RLUSD page: the official issuer account on the XRPL explorer.

What it costs to hold a token

A trust line takes up space on the ledger, so it can lock up a small amount of XRP. XRPL.org says a trust line counts toward the owner reserve when any of its settings is non-default or when the account holds a positive balance, and the account that creates it generally pays the reserve. The same page says a trust line is deleted automatically when both sides are at default settings and the balance is zero.

The two official pages describe the cost differently. XRPL.org says an account’s first two trust lines are free of owner reserve, as long as the account owns at most two ledger items including the new line. Ripple’s RLUSD guide tells users to plan on at least 1.2 XRP for one RLUSD trust line: a 1 XRP base reserve plus a 0.2 XRP owner reserve.

Reserve amounts are set by validator vote and can change. For the current numbers, read the XRPL.org page on reserves. Our earlier explainer on why you cannot send all of your XRP covers how the base reserve works.

What the issuer can do

A trust line is not a locked vault. XRPL.org notes that issuers can freeze trust lines. Ripple’s RLUSD XRPL settings document lists the account settings Ripple chose for the RLUSD issuer. It shows global freeze capability and trust line clawback as enabled, and it shows the setting that would permanently give up the freeze power as not enabled.

In plain terms, according to that document, the issuer keeps tools to freeze balances and to claw tokens back. Ripple’s document was last updated in July 2024, so check the issuer’s current settings and Ripple’s current terms before relying on it.

A checklist before you tap approve

Open Ripple’s RLUSD page yourself and copy the mainnet issuer address from there.
Confirm the issuer in your wallet matches it exactly.
Make sure the wallet is on the main XRP Ledger network, not a test network.
Check that your account has enough XRP to cover the reserve before you add the line.
Keep your recovery phrase private. A trust line request never needs it.

Wallet apps word this step differently, and this article did not review any specific wallet. Use the issuer address, not the screen design, as the test.

Sources

Disclosure: XRPL.org and Ripple describe trust line reserves differently, reserve amounts can change, and Ripple’s settings document dates from July 2024. Wallet screens vary. The featured image is a generated illustration. This article is not financial, legal, or investment advice. AI-assisted research and writing. Cited sources, not AI alone, support the claims.

Market context

Your XRP Wallet Cannot Receive RLUSD Until You Add a Trust Line. Check the Issuer First.