12-hour XRP price. Source: Ripple ChartsThis comes after the news from Ripple that Larsen, the CEO, will donate 7 billion XRP to a foundation that will primarily be focused on the underbanked.According to Coinmarketcap, XRP is currently ranked sixth among distributed currencies. The total XRP in circulation is valued at more than $35m.Executive resignsAfter the abrupt news that McCaleb would sell off his share of XRP, board member Jesse Powell resigned from his position on 24th May. The CEO of the digital exchange Kraken, Powell was an early investor in Ripple.With McCaleb, Powell helped to set up the company before turning focus back to Kraken, which recently raised $5m in investor funding led by Hummingbird Ventures.Powell has apparently been unhappy regarding the large allocations of XRP given to Ripple’s founders, writing in his resignation post:“Unfortunately, unlike the founders, I don’t have swathes of XRP to dump if I don’t think it’s working out.”Legal fights beginRipple Labs, via general counsel George Frost, then sent a cease and desist letter to Powell after his resignation. The letter asked Powell to retract his allegedly defamatory statements within his resignation.“You are using your insider knowledge to sabotage Ripple Labs and wrest large payments for yourself and McCaleb,” Frost declares in the document.Instead of a retraction, Powell expressed his frustration by annotating the document, which has since surfaced on reddit.In the full posting, Powell alleges that billions in XRP were given to Ripple’s founders without board approval. 
30-day XRP prices. Source: CoinmarketcapYet, Powell remained propitiatory in his public reply to Frost’s letter. As an early investor in Ripple, he indicates a desire for Ripple’s success:“I certainly have an interest, and I am rooting for the company’s success. I would prefer not to lose my investment.”Ripple’s early daysThe early incarnation of San Francisco-based Ripple Labs began back in 2011, when the startup was called Opencoin. The project grew out of McCaleb’s idea to build a digital currency that improved on bitcoin, yet catered to a similar community-oriented userbase.This brought the interest of Powell and current chief cryptographer David Schwartz, among others.Larsen has been with Ripple since August 2012. He has helped Ripple raise VC funding for the company from the likes of Google Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz and Lightspeed Venture Partners. 
All-time XRP trading volume. Source: Ripple ChartsThe company began giving away XRP in spring 2013 to longstanding members of the Bitcoin Talk forum. According to McCaleb’s LinkedIn profile, the former CTO left Ripple in July 2013.The future for RippleRipple has lost at least two board members in the past year: McCaleb, and now Powell, though Stanford professor Susan Athey was appointed to the board in April.Despite recent issues among its top brass, however, Ripple has been able to secure a key partnership with German bank Fidor.This signaled the company’s shift towards complete focus as a financial payment protocol, or “rail” for institutions. Company executives told CoinDesk earlier this year that was a pivot for the company.For more on Ripple and its goals in the digital currency marketplace, read our full profile of the company.Image via Ripple LabsChris LarsenJed McCalebJesse PowellRipple LabsXRPOriginal author: Daniel Cawrey