Operator spaces and residually finite-dimensional $C^\ast$-algebras

For every operator space $X$ the $C^\ast$-algebra containing it in a universal way is residually finite-dimensional (that is, has a separating family of finite-dimensional representations). In particular, the free $C^\ast$-algebra on any normed space so is. This is an extension of an earlier result by Goodearl and Menal, and our short proof is based on a criterion due to Exel and Loring.