XLS-0098: On-Chain Insurance Layer for XLS-66 Vaults — Seeking Community Feedback

[wflores9]

Summary

Ward Protocol proposes a native insurance standard for XLS-66 lending
vaults on the XRPL. As institutional capital begins flowing into XRPL
DeFi, vault depositors have no coverage against borrower defaults.
XLS-0098 fills that gap using only native XRPL primitives.

Why Now

Evernorth Holdings (NASDAQ: XRPN), backed by Ripple and SBI Holdings,
has publicly committed to deploying $1B+ into XLS-66 vaults. Institutions
require insurance — without it, serious capital deployment stalls.

How It Works (No Bridges, No Wrappers)

• XLS-20 NFT policy certificates — non-transferable, terms encoded in metadata
• PREIMAGE-SHA-256 escrow — only claimant can finish, no front-running
• 9-step on-chain claim validation
• 48-hour dispute window before payout
• NFT burn on settlement — permanent replay protection

Live Implementation

• SDK: pip install ward-protocol
• API: api.wardprotocol.org
• 75 passing tests, 5 confirmed testnet transactions

Questions for the Community

1. Does this belong as an Ecosystem XLS or a separate XRPLF proposal?
2. Are there existing standards this should build on beyond XLS-66/20/30?
3. Who else is building insurance or risk tooling on XRPL?

Full spec: github.com/wflores9/XRPL-Standards/tree/XLS-0098-insurance-protocol

[wflores9]

Per CONTRIBUTING.md, XLS numbers are assigned automatically on PR creation. This discussion has been renamed accordingly.

[wflores9]

Correction fixed across board, thanks!

[wflores9]

Background

This continues the work from PR #477 (XLS-0098) which was closed pending
community discussion. Per mvadari's feedback, opening this discussion to
gather broader input before resubmitting.

Summary

Ward Protocol proposes a native insurance standard for XLS-66 lending
vaults on the XRPL. As institutional capital begins flowing into XRPL
DeFi, vault depositors have no coverage against borrower defaults.
XLS-0098 fills that gap using only native XRPL primitives.

Why Now

Evernorth Holdings (NASDAQ: XRPN), backed by Ripple and SBI Holdings,
has publicly committed to deploying $1B+ into XLS-66 vaults. Institutions
require insurance — without it, serious capital deployment stalls.

How It Works (No Bridges, No Wrappers)

• XLS-20 NFT policy certificates — non-transferable, terms encoded in metadata
• PREIMAGE-SHA-256 escrow — only claimant can finish, no front-running
• 9-step on-chain claim validation
• 48-hour dispute window before payout
• NFT burn on settlement — permanent replay protection

Live Implementation

• SDK: pip install ward-protocol
• API: api.wardprotocol.org
• 75 passing tests, 5 confirmed testnet transactions

Questions for the Community

1. Does this belong as an Ecosystem XLS or a separate XRPLF proposal?
2. Are there existing standards this should build on beyond XLS-66/20/30?
3. Who else is building insurance or risk tooling on XRPL?
4. Would protocol-level insurance primitives be valuable beyond lending?

Full spec: github.com/wflores9/XRPL-Standards/tree/XLS-0098-insurance-protocol
Closed PR for reference: github.com//pull/477

[wflores9]

Update — following PR #477 closure (Feb 25)

Thank you @mvadari for the clear feedback. Posting this update to gather
the community engagement needed before resubmitting.

Live resources:

• Main site: https://wardprotocol.org
• API docs: https://api.wardprotocol.org/docs
• SDK: pip install ward-protocol
• Full spec: https://github.com/wflores9/XRPL-Standards/tree/XLS-0098-insurance-protocol

Questions for the community (please reply!):

1. Would your vault team or institution be interested in integrating Ward insurance?
2. Feedback on using XLS-20 NFTs for policies and XLS-30 AMM for pools?
3. Any concerns with the 9-step claim validation or 200% coverage ratio?
4. Should we expand compatibility to other XRPL lending primitives early?
5. Ecosystem-first (no amendment) vs future native primitives — thoughts?

This is the insurance layer XRPL DeFi needs to unlock institutional
capital. Looking forward to your input! 🚀

[wflores9]

Tagging the authors of the primitives Ward builds on:

• XLS-20, XLS-30, XLS-70, XLS-80: @mvadari
• XLS-66: @mvadari @Tapanito @ximinez @AdamJSc

Would love your input since Ward directly integrates all of these
primitives into a unified insurance layer.