XRP, the native coin for the Ripple network has been on a rollercoaster ride since tapping an all-time high of $3.85 in January 2018. Plagued by an ongoing lawsuit by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), as well as global macro-economic hardships, the coin’s price has dunked about 80% since last year.
As of reporting, XRP is trading at around $0.385 after gaining 1.95% on the day. That said, although this level can be described as dangerous given that the coin has broken the $0.4 multiyear support, a lot is happening fundamentally, suggesting that investors are confident price could be soon out of the woods.
According to Santiment, XRP whales have been notably busy of late with prices dipping. In a tweet this week, the analytics firm wrote,
“XRP network whales holding between 1M and 10M $XRP have collectively been accumulating, and now hold their highest percentage of the asset’s supply in 2 months.” XRP whales in this category are the most active in the non-exchange holders’ category and currently hold 6.12% of all the coins in circulation.
This level of activity has also been reflected in XRP maintaining a strong market capitalization. Currently, XRP falls in sixth place with a market valuation of $18.6B, just behind Binance Chain’s BNB after toppling BUSD and Cardano.
XRP’s silver lining could also be pegged to the fact that Ripple has been doing more outside the price factor. In the past two or so years, the Ripple team has been mostly building products aimed at improving the network in the long run while promoting their maiden cross-border payment products. In the first quarter of 2022, the volume of Ripple’s cross-border payments product “On-Demand Liquidity (ODL)” totaled $8B compared to just $1B at the same time last year.
In an interview with CNBC earlier this week, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse also hinted at a plan to explore the possibility of an Initial Public Offering (IPO) once its lawsuit with the SEC culminates.
If this happens, XRP could recover and embark on a sustained bull run with major US exchanges listing it. For now, XRP risks plunging to $0.33 should it lose support at $0.35. However, strong rejection wicks on the daily candles in the past two weeks along the $0.38 level suggests strong which could slow down the sell-off at least for now.
