Ripple Price Prediction: XRP accelerates rally aiming for $3.00
- XRP bulls eye support above $2.40, piggybacking on growing risk-on sentiment in the broader cryptocurrency market.
- The number of addresses on the XRP Ledger hit record highs, averaging 7.3 million.
- Interest in XRP derivatives steadily rises, backed by a surge in futures Open Interest, reaching $5.56 on Thursday.
Ripple (XRP) price extends recovery, reaching highs of around $2.49 on Thursday. The bullish wave cut across the crypto market, underpinning rising risk-on sentiment, as investors seek refuge in riskier assets like Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH) and XRP due to escalating macroeconomic uncertainty amid tariff developments in the United States (US).
Meanwhile, XRP shows that it has the potential to accelerate the uptrend, targeting highs above $3.00 in the short term, backed by a recent breakout from an inverse Head-and-Shoulders (H&S) pattern and strong fundamentals.
XRP bulls tighten grip amid steady fundamentals
The number of addresses on the XRP Ledger (XRP) has progressively increased over the past two years. According to Glassnode, addresses on the protocol currently average 7.3 million compared to 6.3 million on January 1 and 5.7 million on July 10, 2024.
A surge in the Number of Addresses metric indicates increased participation from both retail and institutional investors. As network usage increases with more transactions, there is a corresponding upswing in trading fees and interactions on the XRP Ledger.
Number of Addresses metric | Glassnode
The derivatives market paints a clear picture of the rising interest in XRP, particularly with the futures Open Interest (OI) steadily rising to $5.56 billion from $3.54 billion, posted on June 23.
XRP futures Open Interest | Source: Coinglass
A subsequent increase in the trading volume by nearly 30% to approximately $9 billion signals heightened market activity. In other words, traders are betting more on future price increases than XRP declining.
Liquidations surged in the past 24 hours, reaching $10 million, with short positions accounting for the lion’s share at $8 million. The long-to-short ratio also ticked up, averaging 0.9904 at the time of writing, which emphasizes a bullish bias.
XRP derivatives market data | Source| CoinGlass
Technical outlook: XRP offers bullish signals
XRP price flaunts a robust technical structure backed by growing institutional and retail interest. Bulls appear to have the upper hand, with a buy signal from the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) steadying risk-on sentiment.
The MACD indicator has maintained the buy signal since Sunday (see the 8-hour chart below), with the green histogram bars indicating bullish momentum. With a breakout from the inverse H&S pattern confirmed, XRP could extend the uptrend to $2.76 and significantly close the gap to the round-figure resistance at $3.00.
XRP/ISDT 8-hour chart
A Golden Cross pattern, established when the 50-period Exponential Moving Average (EMA) crossed above the 200-period EMA on Wednesday, backs the bullish structure.
Traders should also look for a break and close above the immediate resistance at $2.46 to ascertain the strength of the uptrend. On the contrary, potential profit-taking and the possibility of market dynamics changing, especially with tariff uncertainty in the US, could lead to a pullback.
Key areas likely to serve as support lie at the 50-period EMA ($2.25) and the confluence formed by the converging 100-period EMA and 200-period EMA at $2.23.
SEC vs Ripple lawsuit FAQs
It depends on the transaction, according to a court ruling released on July 14, 2023: For institutional investors or over-the-counter sales, XRP is a security. For retail investors who bought the token via programmatic sales on exchanges, on-demand liquidity services and other platforms, XRP is not a security.
The United States Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) accused Ripple and its executives of raising more than $1.3 billion through an unregistered asset offering of the XRP token. While the judge ruled that programmatic sales aren’t considered securities, sales of XRP tokens to institutional investors are indeed investment contracts. In this last case, Ripple did breach the US securities law and had to pay a $125 million civil fine.
The ruling offers a partial win for both Ripple and the SEC, depending on what one looks at. Ripple gets a big win over the fact that programmatic sales aren’t considered securities, and this could bode well for the broader crypto sector as most of the assets eyed by the SEC’s crackdown are handled by decentralized entities that sold their tokens mostly to retail investors via exchange platforms, experts say. Still, the ruling doesn’t help much to answer the key question of what makes a digital asset a security, so it isn’t clear yet if this lawsuit will set precedent for other open cases that affect dozens of digital assets. Topics such as which is the right degree of decentralization to avoid the “security” label or where to draw the line between institutional and programmatic sales persist.
The SEC has stepped up its enforcement actions toward the blockchain and digital assets industry, filing charges against platforms such as Coinbase or Binance for allegedly violating the US Securities law. The SEC claims that the majority of crypto assets are securities and thus subject to strict regulation. While defendants can use parts of Ripple’s ruling in their favor, the SEC can also find reasons in it to keep its current strategy of regulation by enforcement.
Author
John Isige
FXStreet
John Isige is a seasoned cryptocurrency journalist and markets analyst committed to delivering high-quality, actionable insights tailored to traders, investors, and crypto enthusiasts. He enjoys deep dives into emerging Web3 tren
