A very detailed article. XRP and Ripple do seem to be the leaders with settling cross borders transaction. As you said that Ripple own most of the XRP tokens that means they can manipulate the price but also it does not really make XRP decentralised. I believe XRP could make it as a digital currency (For example companies that have multiple locations could accept and use XRP as a form of payment to save money on using multiple currencies), but it does have stiff competition from Stellar lumens and Nano potentially.
Interesting with your views on Bitcoin et al. I think Bitcoin still has good value as it is the major pairing with the majority alt coin pairings. Litecoin and Bitcoin seem to be better for cheaper and faster transactions, but I think Bitcoin will be the major store of value for digital assets for the time being.
thanks my friend