Several large lumps of XRP were transferred after Ripple giant moved billion of them
According to Whale Alert, unidentified wallets have transferred enormous amounts of XRP across cryptocurrency exchanges over the last 15 hours. The Ripple juggernaut had sent a staggering billion XRP the day before.
Hundreds of Millions of XRP Moved by Anon Wallets After Ripple Shifted Billion XRP
The cryptocurrency above tracking platform has recently discovered three sizable transfers of XRP from wallets that it has flagged as “unknown”. The combined value of these three transfers—40, 30, and 147.8 million XRP—is 218 million XRP tokens, or about $73 million. Out of these three, the first two transactions were made to a Bitstamp wallet. An account associated with the big Bittrex exchange sent 40,000,000 XRP to wallets connected to the Bitstamp exchange. From the same platform as the transaction that delivered 30,000,000 XRP to Bitstamp.
The 148,700,000 XRP chunk was sent from a single anonymous wallet to Bittrex via the Binance exchange.
🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 148,700,000 #XRP (50,372,552 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallethttps://t.co/As14PhPM9r
— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) January 1, 2023
A massive 1 billion XRP was set to be withdrawn from escrow on January 1 by fintech giant Ripple. Since the company decided to support the usability of the token in the market and to supply its partners and clients (banks and other financial institutions) with enough XRP in 2017–2018, it has been making these monthly payment transfers. Initially, 55% of the 100 billion XRP supply was held in escrow by Ripple, which has been releasing 1 billion per month for the past five years or so.
Typically, of that unlocked amount, 200–300 million XRP are released into the market, while the remaining portion is kept locked away in an escrow account. Whale Alert did not record any transactions that would have returned hundreds of millions of XRP to escrow, nevertheless, this time.
XRP price has experienced a harsh downward movement
By the time this article went to print, the price had already recovered to $0.3322, wiping off the most of the unexpected price drop. The current resistance level for XRP is $0.3333, which has not yet been overcome.
XRP/USD 4-hour chart | Source: TradingView
On the first of the month, one particular event frequently captures the attention of XRP investors: the release of 1 billion XRP from Ripple’s escrow account, which took place Sunday. This is unlikely to have started the abrupt sell-off under normal circumstances. The incident has long been known in the neighborhood, but there was a little bit of a surprise this time.
According to Whale Alert, XRP was not directly unlocked from Ripple escrow accounts this time; instead, it was done through unidentified accounts. But Bithomp recognized the addresses as belonging to Ripple.
🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 🔓 500,000,000 #XRP (170,074,826 USD) unlocked from escrow at unknown wallethttps://t.co/yymqzSjLYk
— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) January 1, 2023
A retest of the level at $0.2641 would now be the most bearish scenario, according to the 1-day chart. The price level may offer strong support, where liquidity may already be present.
For the time being, investors should keep an eye on the $0.3205 level. The 6-month low at $0.2870 would be another region where XRP might experience a bounce if this breaks.
Read more:
- Update On The Ripple V. SEC Litigation
- Due To Recent Comments Made By The US DOJ About Cryptocurrencies, Ripple May Have An Advantage Over The SEC
- The CTO Of Ripple Explains Why The XRP Price Is So Low