XRP Ledger

What a Trustodian XRP wallet is, why the curve matters, and why a vault has no master key

m/44'/144'/0'/0/{index}

BIP-44 on secp256k1, coin type 144. The address is an XRP Ledger classic address, beginning with r.

Trustodian XRP keys are secp256k1, not ed25519. The XRP Ledger supports both curves, and some tools default to ed25519 when importing a seed. The same secret under the other curve produces a different address. If an import offers a choice of algorithm or key type, choose secp256k1.

The index

{index} is the address leaf, under one account at m/44'/144'/0'.

Trustodian XRP wallet	Path
1st	m/44'/144'/0'/0/0
2nd	m/44'/144'/0'/0/1
3rd	m/44'/144'/0'/0/2

Xaman

Xaman is the main XRP Ledger wallet with an import flow. It accepts a family seed (a short string beginning with s), secret numbers, and a mnemonic.

Xaman’s mnemonic import gives you no control over the derivation path or the account index. You enter the words and it shows one resulting r... address. There is no path field and no account selector.

It can therefore only ever reach one wallet, and only if its own default derivation happens to match. Treat it as something to try and verify, not as the reliable route.

Xaman also does not accept every phrase length. Trustodian issues 12, 15, 18, 21 and 24 word phrases; check Xaman’s own documentation for the lengths its mnemonic import takes before counting on it.

1. Install Xaman from xaman.app

   Type the domain yourself, or install from your platform’s app store having checked the publisher.

2. Import an account using the mnemonic option

   Not the family seed or secret numbers options: those take different secrets entirely.

3. Check the address it produces

   Compare the r... address against your Trustodian XRP wallet. If it matches, you are done. If it does not, retrying will not correct it; use the fallback below.

Deriving the key yourself

If Xaman’s import does not land on your address, or you need a wallet at an index above 0, derive the key outside the wallet.

On an offline machine, use a BIP-39 derivation tool that lets you set the coin type and the curve, set the path to m/44'/144'/0'/0/{index} and the key type to secp256k1, and take the resulting secret. Check the address it reports against your Trustodian wallet before importing the secret into Xaman as a family seed.

Do this on a machine with no network connection, and destroy the working copy afterwards. A tool that derives a key is a tool that has seen your phrase.

Account reserves

The XRP Ledger requires a funded account to exist at all, and holds part of the balance as a reserve that cannot be sent. Two consequences for recovery:

• An address that was never funded does not exist on the ledger. A wallet may report it as not found rather than as an empty account. This is normal and does not mean the key is wrong.
• You cannot empty an XRP account down to zero by an ordinary payment. Moving the reserve requires deleting the account, which has its own conditions.

Destination tags

If you move funds from a recovered wallet to an exchange, the exchange almost certainly requires a destination tag. A payment sent without it is credited to nobody, and recovering it depends entirely on the exchange’s support process.

Vaults

An XRP vault is the account’s signer list, which lives on the chain, so nothing has to be rebuilt. Your Recovery Kit records the vault’s account address, and notes there that the master key is off.

A Trustodian XRP vault has no master key. Activation submits two transactions: SignerListSet, which installs the signer list, and DisableMaster, which turns off the account’s own master key.

The account can therefore be moved only by a quorum of its signer list. No single key can rescue it, including the key it was created with. Recovering an XRP vault means gathering enough signers, not finding one key.

The procedure is on XRP vaults. See also How vaults recover.