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Brad is among the most influential figures in digital assets and blockchain technology.
Bradley Kent Garlinghouse (born February 4th, 1971) is an American business management expert and CEO of Ripple Labs, the parent company of the Ripple (XRP) cryptocurrency. Brad is also one of the biggest Ripple whales whose net worth is rumored to be tied to Ripple’s current price.
His early life
Brad Garlinghouse was born in Topeka, Kansas, but lives in San Francisco with his family. He earned his first degree in Economics from the University of Kansas and later earned his MBA from Harvard Business School.
After graduating, he served as a management consultant at various forms, including McKinsey & Company, a corporate management consulting firm, Yahoo! AOL, etc.
Brad Garlinghouse served as the CEO and chairman of Hightail, a cloud service that lets you send and receive digitally signed and synchronized files.
And now, he runs Ripple Labs as the CEO.
Brad Garlinghouse’s Net Worth in 2024
According to Forbes, Brad Garlinghouse has an estimated net worth of $9.5 billion. Brad is rumored to be a Ripple (XRP) whale, and his net worth increased significantly due to his 6.3% stake in Ripple.
After Ripple Labs partially won its case against the United States Security Exchange Commission, establishing that Ripple (XRP) tokens are not securities, most Ripple investors experienced a boost in their net worth, including Brad Garlinghouse.
Brad Garlinghouse’s Wife
Brad Garlinghouse is married to Kristen Elizabeth Mautner, a senior lacrosse executive. Her roles in the USA Lacrosse Executive Committee, the USA Lacrosse Foundation Board, and the Tewaaraton Foundation highlight her commitment to promoting lacrosse.
Additionally, her leadership as the national co-chair of the National Campaign for Lacrosse reflects a significant contribution to funding initiatives for USA Lacrosse’s new headquarters and supporting sports science, safety, and community-focused efforts.
Brad Garlinghouse’s Career
Brad Garlinghouse started his career as a management consultant at @Home Network and @Ventures before joining Dialpad as CEO from 2000 to 2001. Dialpad specializes in VOIP services and computer-to-computer calling services.
In 2003, Brad joined Yahoo! as the Senior Vice President. He ran the Homepage, Flickr, Yahoo! Mail, and Yahoo! Messenger divisions.
While at Yahoo!, he published an iconic internal memo titled “Peanut Butter” Manifesto, in which he charged the company to focus on its vision rather than narrowing its services, like peanut butter.
Brad left Yahoo! in 2008 and joined Silver Lake Partners, a leading private equity firm, as a Senior Advisor.
Garlinghouse became President of Consumer Applications at AOL from 2009 to 2011 and led AOL’s efforts to expand the reach of its mobile and consumer products globally (such as AOL Mail and AIM).
Brad joined the board of directors of video startup Animoto in April 2012.
After Animoto, Brad Garlinghouse joined Hightail and was the CEO until September 2014. Unfortunately, he resigned after a disagreement with the board regarding company direction.
In April 2015, Brad joined Ripple Labs, the parent company of Ripple cryptocurrency and the Ripple Blockchain, as the Chief Operations Officer, reporting to the former CEO and co-founder Chris Larsen.
After one year, Brad became the CEO in December 2016. He was promoted for his hard work and dedication to the company.
On December 23rd, 2020, the SEC issued a complaint accusing Brad Garlinghouse, Ripple Chairman Chris Larsen, and Ripple Labs of committing multiple breaches of securities laws. While the case was pending, Garlinghouse criticized the SEC’s lack of clarity on the status of Ripple’s products, referring to SEC chairman Gary Gensler as an autocrat and tweeting that “without clear jurisdiction, ambiguity masquerades as power.”
In July 2023, presiding judge Analisa Torres of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York held that the company’s cryptocurrency token offering was “not a security,” enabling the token to be relisted on exchanges.
In November 2023, the SEC dropped all claims against Garlinghouse and Larsen.
Brad Garlinghouse’s Tattoo
In 2023, Brad Garlinghouse, Ripple’s CEO, made a personal statement about his loyalty and dedication to XRP. Brad quietly revealed this on social media following Ripple’s celebratory party in New York City, called “The Proper Party.“
While the crypto community anticipated major announcements amid the event, none related to XRP materialized. Instead, Brad Garlinghouse took to social media after the party to share a personal milestone: his new tattoo featuring XRP’s logo.
Brad said in a brief post, “Tonight’s event is just a celebration…but I will share my recent addition.”
This unassuming act of getting a popular cryptocurrency logo tattooed sends ripples through the XRP community.
Garlinghouse’s post garnered an impressive 300,000 impressions, showing the impact of this subtle yet powerful declaration.
