Ripple price prediction: What’s next for XRP?
XRP, one of the oldest cryptocurrencies around, must cope with increasingly uncertain times
Contents
The XRP cryptocurrency has been around for a long time and is still one of the biggest cryptos out there. But what is Ripple (XRP)? What is it designed to do? And what is the Ripple price prediction? We will answer that last question later, but first, let’s take a look at what Ripple is and what Ripple does.
Ripple Labs is the name of the company and Ripple is the protocol, which is powered by the XRP, or Ripple, cryptocurrency. The idea behind Ripple is to speed up the international transfer of money which, its supporters claim, should help attract more people in a time of increasing globalisation.
There is even a belief in certain quarters that it will end up replacing the current SWIFT/BIC system of international bank transfers. If that does happen – and it is a big if – that could really change the Ripple coin price prediction.
In terms of the XRP coin itself, it can be used to transfer assets on the Ripple network and it can also be bought, sold and traded on crypto exchanges.
Founders
Ripple was founded in 2012 by programmer Jed McCaleb, originally from Arkansas, and entrepreneur Chris Larsen, founder of the online mortgage lender ELoan. McCaleb left the company in 2013, but Larsen still serves as Ripple Labs’ executive chairman, while the company’s CEO is Brad Garlinghouse.
If you want to know how Ripple works, before we get to a Ripple price forecast, let’s take a look at that. Something that is worth noting is that, whereas a cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin allows anyone to validate transactions and secure the network, Ripple only lets approved users do this. That does make it a bit more centralised that other cryptos, but also allows it to be a bit more secure, at least in theory.
The other thing to note, and something which speaks to just how long the XRP coin has been going, is that Ripple, the company, is for-profit. This contrasts with a lot of crypto organisations, which are non-profit. The idea of a non-profit foundation in effect running a cryptocurrency, so far as cryptocurrencies can be run, did not really become the norm until long after the Ripple coin came onto the market and people started making Ripple price forecasts.
XRP not mineable
The other thing to point out is that XRP is not a mineable cryptocurrency, unlike the likes of Bitcoin. Instead, every single one of the 100 billion Ripple coins that have ever or will ever exist were created by Ripple and, as of 18 August 2022, there were 49.38 billion XRP in circulation.
What we should note, though, is that, at the time of writing, the total supply of XRP was 99,989,361,309, which would indicate that a comparatively small amount of Ripple – 10,638,691 to be precise – has been burned and taken out of the market. Ripple has said that it does not burn its own coins although, in 2021, Garlinghouse said that he would not rule out doing so in an attempt to maintain or even boost the price at some stage.
Furthermore, Ripple CTO David Schwarz has also said that there is nothing stopping XRP holders from burning their coins themselves. It is probable that it has been users, rather than the company behind the coin, that have been burning a limited amount of Ripple.
Nevertheless, it is worth noting that there is a relatively large number of XRP in circulation compared with the likes of Bitcoin. This has the side effect of ensuring that Ripple is highly unlikely to reach the price heights of cryptos like BTC or ETH. On the other hand, this does not mean that XRP cannot go up by a considerable amount in relative terms. You can, at least in theory, turn a significant profit (or, for that matter, a massive loss) on Ripple without the coin itself being worth that much.
The main blockchain for the Ripple coin is called the XRP ledger. It is designed to allow people to send transactions to the network for consideration. As we have already explained, there is no mining when it comes to XRP, so there is some debate as to whether it can be considered to be a true blockchain.
For a transaction to be considered valid, it has to be approved by computers, or nodes, on the network called unique nodes, which have a list of approved unique nodes which, in turn, gives them the power to approve transactions. Having an approved list, at least in theory, allows transactions to take place more quickly, which makes things far more convenient for the system’s users.
How to get hold of XRP
Being one of the largest cryptocurrencies, XRP is listed on most major exchanges.
Every month around a billion Ripple are taken out of an escrow account and given to Ripple itself. The company then takes the money it has drawn out and puts some on the market, with the rest returning to escrow. This means a steady supply of Ripple becomes available every month, meaning theoretically that more people can use Ripple, which means that there is potentially more demand for it, which should cause the XRP price to move up. That does not always happen, as we will see when we look at the Ripple coin price history, but the idea is there.
The important thing to note when examining a Ripple crypto price prediction is that how much the coin will be worth in the future could well depend on a court ruling. The biggest issue facing Ripple right now is its ongoing lawsuit with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the US.
The SEC argues that XRP is an unregistered security, a claim that Ripple denies. An upbeat Ripple price prediction hinges on the company winning the case – if it loses, things could go horribly wrong.
The case was filed on 22 December 2020 and is still ongoing. The case names Larsen and Garlinghouse, accusing them of raising money, starting in 2013, “through the sale of digital assets known as XRP in an unregistered securities offering to investors in the US and worldwide”.
XRP allegations
Ripple also allegedly distributed billions of XRP in exchange for non-cash considerations, such as labour and market-making services. According to the complaint, in addition to structuring and promoting the XRP sales used to finance the company’s business, Larsen and Garlinghouse also effected personal unregistered sales of XRP totalling approximately $600m.
The complaint alleges that the defendants failed to register their offers and sales of XRP or satisfy any exemption from registration, in violation of the registration provisions of the federal securities laws.
Since the case was filed, things have moved comparatively slowly. In March 2022, Ripple alleged that the commission had not given it enough warning that it would consider XRP to be a security. The SEC suggested that the US District Court for the Southern District of New York dismiss Ripple’s claims, but the motion to dismiss them was rejected by the judge, Analisa Torres, who ruled: “The SEC has not shown that it will suffer undue prejudice as a result of the continuation of Ripple’s fair notice defence. An increase in the time, expense and complexity of a trial may constitute sufficient prejudice to warrant granting a plaintiff’s motion to strike.
“The SEC does not contend that Ripple’s affirmative defence is untimely, and the Court shall not conclude, at this early stage of the case, that Ripple’s defence is invalid.”
Garlinghouse took to Twitter, proclaiming the judge’s findings as a “huge win” for both Ripple and XRP. That said, he had rather less to say about Judge Torres’ dismissal of an application from the company. Ripple had tried to argue that, even if the SEC’s allegations were true, they would not actually contain enough evidence to win the case, calling for the matter to be dismissed. The application was declined.
Wait and see on Ripple case
At the heart of the court hearing is whether or not XRP, which operates globally, can be placed under the jurisdiction of the SEC, which can only operate within the US. One potential upshot of an SEC win could be that more cryptos will be found to have been acting unlawfully in the US, which could have a massive negative impact on the market as a whole.
However, the case is unlikely to be over until 2023 at the earliest, so we shall have to wait and see what happens and what Judge Torres’ ruling may be. There was some good news in June 2022, when a judge ruled that a speech by former SEC director William Hinman could be used in evidence by Ripple. The following month, the court was still deciding whether certain evidence could, or could not, be heard in the case. This included testimony from pro-crypto lawyer John Deaton as to whether certain witnesses on the SEC’s side were eligible for consideration as experts, and whether they were able to give their evidence without revealing their identities. In August, a judge granted Ripple permission to issue a subpoena to authenticate videos of SEC officials public remarks.
Before we take a look at the Ripple price prediction, though, let’s take a look at the XRP price history. The important thing to note here is that, while past performance is never any indicator of future results, knowing how the XRP coin has behaved in the past can give some much-needed context when both examining and making an XRP price prediction.
Ripple is one of the longest-lasting cryptocurrencies out there. Launched in 2012, for much of its early years it traded at less than $0.10. This changed somewhat when the cryptocurrency market went into a bubble in late 2017 and early 2018. XRP was one of the many cryptos to benefit from this, and it reached an all-time high of $3.84 on 4 January 2018.
The coin then fell down and by the end of the year was trading at below $0.50. The value of XRP kept dropping and it ended up spending most of 2020 at around the $0.20 mark. There was some growth towards the end of the year, and XRP ended 2020 at $0.2198.
At this point the cryptocurrency market entered a serious boom phase and XRP was in the foothills of a bull run that culminated on 14 April 2021 when it hit an intraday high of $1.96, which would have led to some upward adjusting of XRP price forecasts. While that was the apogee, the upshot was that XRP had found a new level, with consistent trading at more than $1 for much of April and May.
Even the great crypto day crash of 19 May 2021 did not completely destroy its supra-dollar ambitions, with the coin reaching intraday highs of $1.05 as late as 4 June. However, the poor performance of the crypto market hindered the coin’s performance somewhat, and it reached a nadir of $0.5127 on 22 June 2021.
This, inevitably, meant that there would be a recovery. While this did not quite happen right away, by the end of July 2021, the coin was worth $0.7478. August was a good time for crypto, with an increased interest in non-fungible tokens (NFTs) helping it get back from the summer’s losses – even a coin like XRP, which has little if anything to do with NFTs, was able to perform well. On 11 August, it traded above $1 for the first time in more than two months, and it closed August at $1.19.
While September 2021 was disappointing, with XRP closing at $0.9526, October was a bit more encouraging, with the coin ending the month at $1.35.
The cryptocurrency market’s bullish behaviour in early November 2021 boosted the price of XRP to $1.35, but market uncertainty surrounding the Omicron variant of Covid-19 saw the coin slip to close the month at $0.9988. The downward turn continued through December and, while the coin re-emerged briefly over $1 when it reached an intraday high of $1.02 on 23 December, XRP closed 2021 at $0.8312.
Things got even worse in January 2022, when a weak crypto market led XRP to finish the month at $0.6191. The start of February looked pretty positive, with XRP hitting a high of $0.9111 on 8 February. However, things started to gently move down and the dip was exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, when the coin fell to a low of $0.6271.
Since then, there has been some recovery, and reports that SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce was doubtful about her organisation’s chances of winning its case helped move the price of XRP to around $0.73 on 10 March, before it grew further to trade at $0.79 on 17 March 2022. On 1 April, the price declined following the release of one billion XRP, but with 800 million of those returned to escrow, the market went back up and by 6 April 2022, XRP was worth a little under $0.80.
The news that China had banned crypto then hit the coin and, on 28 April, it was worth just under $0.65 and its price went down in a bearish market to hover around the $0.54 mark on 9 May 2022. After that, the market turmoil following the depegging of the TerraUSD stablecoin and the collapse of the LUNA crypto saw it fall futher to $0.345 on 12 May.
There was then a small recovery and the price of XRP stood at about $0.388 on 26 May 2022, closing the month at $0.4219. In June, the price dipped and, on 10 June 2022, it was worth around $0.40. After that, the news that the Celsius crypto lending platform had cancelled withdrawals confirmed that crypto was in a bear market and, on 18 June 2022, XRP fell to $0.2906.
Following that, though, there has been some recovery. On 20 July, it reached a high of $0.3811, dropped to $0.3264 on 26 July and hit $0.4079 on 30 July. The price has fallen since then, though, and on 18 August it stood at about $0.373.
Ripple price prediction
Now let’s look at the Ripple price prediction. We have to point out, at this stage, that cryptocurrency price forecasts are often wrong. We also need to mention that longer-term crypto price predictions are often made using an algorithm, which can change at any moment.
First, CryptoNewsZ has an XRP price prediction that says the coin can, potentially, reach $0.44 this year before climbing to as high as $0.52 in 2023. The site’s Ripple price prediction for 2025 sees it trading between $0.53 and $0.68. The site’s XRP price forecast says the coin could be as high as $1 in 2030.
Second, PricePrediction.net has a positive Ripple price forecast, with nothing but upward movements for XRP year-on-year over the next nine years or so. The site says Ripple’s average price will be $0.43 in 2022, $0.63 in 2023, $0.91 in 2024 and $1.36 in 2025. The rise will continue in 2026, when XRP could be hitting $2.03, and 2027, when it should be worth $2.95.
The coin will stand at an average of £4.28 in 2028 and it should finish the decade at $6.28, according to the site. There is a Ripple price prediction for 2030 that says XRP should be worth $8.87, while in 2031 it should trade at around $13.14.
Meanwhile, LongForecast is far more bearish in its outlook. It has a Ripple price prediction for 2022 that sees it close the year at $0.30 and sees worse times ahead, with it dropping to $0.15 by the end of 2023. There will be a recovery back to $0.123 in October 2024, but the price could collapse to $0.11 a year from then. The bad times will not be over, though and, in Septmeber 2026, LongForecast suggests XRP will be worth a mere $0.07.
Finally, WalletInvestor is more optimistic, suggesting that XRP can reach around $0.586 in July 2023 before continuing some slow growth to trade at about $1.39 in July 2027.
A few final thoughts
The most important thing to note about XRP is that its future price depends a lot on whether a US court sides with the SEC over claims that it represents an unregistered security. The court case has been an issue for a long time now and it has, ultimately, kept the price of Ripple down as potential investors opt for something where there is less of a possibility of imposed failure.
Put simply, if Ripple wins the case, then we can expect the price to go up, although we do not know by how much. If it loses, it seems reasonable to suppose that XRP could be a dead coin.
Second, XRP is one of the larger cryptos out there, so there are more things outside of the court case that could have an impact on its price as more people are likely to either want to buy it or sell it.
Third, while there is some hope that it could become the new standard for international money transfers, those hopes may be hopelessly optimistic. One of the quirks of the crypto world is that there are some fans who, with their incessant talk of a new industrial revolution, may actually deter outsiders as they become increasingly cynical regarding enthusiasts’ ever more outlandish pronouncements.
As always with cryptocurrency, it pays to be careful.
FAQs
How many Ripple are there?
As of 18 August 2022, there were 48.34 billion XRP in circulation out of a total supply of 100 billion.
Is Ripple a good investment?
It might well be. Keep in mind that, while it is worth less than it was at this time last year, so some might advise buying in the dip, there have been plenty of ups and downs, and we still do not know what will happen with the court case.
Before you invest, you should do your own research, and make sure never to invest more money than you can afford to lose.
Will Ripple go up?
It might do but, considering we do not know what will happen with the ongoing court case with the SEC, it could just as easily go down. You will need to be careful if you want to buy XRP.
Should I invest in Ripple?
This is a question that only you can answer. Before you do, you will need to do your own research, remember prices can go down as well as up, and make sure you do not invest more money than you can afford to lose.
