XRP Struggles Below $1 Despite Strong Holder Conviction

XRP has just lost a level it had defended since late 2024. Briefly falling below $1, Ripple’s token now shows more than a 5% drop over one month, unlike Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana. Yet behind this weakness lies a paradox: long-term investors are massively accumulating, while derivatives markets intensify selling pressure and flows to ETFs have sharply dried up. Two opposing forces now clash around XRP, and their duel could determine the token’s next move.

The silent accumulation of major investors and the drying up of deposits

Despite a continuously falling double-digit market capitalization over recent weeks, on-chain indicators attest to massive accumulation by the biggest holders in the market. According to analysts at Santiment, 32 new wallets have been added to the number of addresses holding at least one million XRP during the last three months. Thus, these gradual acquisitions methodically absorb the coordinated bearish pressure from retail investors.

Santiment’s team of experts views such dynamics as a long-term conviction strategy. They state: “when the number of wallets holding at least one million XRP increases while market capitalization decreases, it means the strong hands absorb the panic. Patience takes precedence over mere speculative enthusiasm related to price, and the prospects of future volatility become all the more attractive for buyers.” Additionally, there is a quantitative increase in daily interactions due to user behavior on the network. Active addresses rose from 26,400 in July to 35,700 in August. August 11th saw a peak in activity, unmatched since June 5th.

The current state of centralized exchanges shows tokens locked outside immediate selling circuits. Data published by CryptoOnchain reveals a considerable drop of 96% compared to monthly and quarterly norms. Meanwhile, inflow and outflow volumes have respectively fallen by 79% and 85% relative to their 90-day moving averages. Moreover, for CryptoOnchain’s analyst, this trend reflects strict retention of XRP coins: “The network records strong activity, but tokens are not transferred to exchanges to be sold.” In this context, the majority of long-term XRP holders, far from succumbing to general panic, deliberately chose to isolate their positions off-exchange despite the price correction.

Such resilience by the network’s historical holders is reflected through various accumulation metrics :

• Growth in the number of whales : wallets holding at least one million XRP have increased by 32 over the last three months, amidst falling prices ;
• Collapse of deposit activity on Binance : a 96% drop in XRP deposit addresses compared to usual averages, alongside a decline in inflows (-79%) and outflows (-85%) ;
• Steady increase in network usage : daily active addresses rose to an average of 35,700 in August (up from 26,400 in July), peaking on August 11.

Stagnant adoption under selling pressure from derivatives

Despite the strength of activity from historical wallets, this does not demonstrate an ecosystem growth nor buying momentum on futures markets. In this perspective, Santiment nuances the overall picture. The analytics platform indicates that new address creation is stubbornly stagnant at 2,260 per day currently, compared to 2,270 in July. Analysts state: “presenting the situation as growing user activity is only half true. The existing user base is simply conducting more transactions, but the overall number of wallets is not increasing.”

Without new dynamism in the network, short-term speculation would continue to influence prices. Regarding the derivatives market on the Binance exchange, selling pressure is firmly established. The taker buy/sell ratio plunged to 0.86, its lowest value since May. Analyst Arab Chain highlights the significance of this figure: “a value below 1 indicates that the volume of sell orders executed by traders exceeds buy orders, thus reflecting clear selling pressure from market participants operating directly on the market.”

A Cumulative Volume Delta (CVD) confirms this clear dominance of sellers. The indicator remains in the red around –4.15 million, despite maintaining a 0.84 correlation with price. Arab Chain draws this conclusion: “despite strong CVD-price correlation, the CVD value remains anchored in negative territory. This shows market flows strongly favor selling, proving buying activity is insufficient to shift net flow balance into positive territory.” Therefore, short-term sellers continue setting the pace against buyers unable to reverse the trend in order books.

The scarcity of flows on XRP ETFs

Institutional investors are also slowing down. Data from SoSoValue shows that XRP ETFs have recorded a zero net balance over the last four sessions. Such a steep decline was spectacular in the week ending August 7.

Indeed, these products, after accumulating $14.86 million the previous week, attracted only $1.01 million, a colossal drop of 93%. Thus, over the last twelve days of this August, cumulative inflows barely exceed this mere million dollars, indicating temporary disinterest from professional investors.

Ultimately, the confrontation between whales’ firmness and retail investors’ disinterest in ETFs as well as derivatives places XRP in a precarious balance. The absence of new users contributes to limiting the market’s capacity to absorb aggressive selling by short-term traders. A resumption of inflows into ETFs could trigger sustainable bullish dynamics.