XRP (XRP) exchange rate: has one of the leading cryptocurrencies renewed its high?
The Ripple platform is one of the first second-generation blockchains, along with Ethereum. It has its own unique consensus mechanism to process transactions, and it is one of the top ten largest projects in the cryptocurrency market.
The formative period of XRP (2013 - 2017)
The Ripple cryptocurrency first appeared on cryptocurrency exchanges in August 2013 — two years earlier than the now-leading altcoin Ethereum. At the time of listing, the XRP cryptocurrency's exchange rate was $0.0058; since then, the asset's price has increased nearly 100 times as of September 2024.
The price of Ripple reached its first significant all-time high (ATH) in December 2013 at $0.058, which is 10 times the listing price — it only took the cryptocurrency a quarter to do so.
However, after the infamous events of the Mt. Gox exchange's bankruptcy and the theft of 140,000 BTC, the XRP cryptocurrency rate collapsed to an all-time low of $0.0028 in July 2014. Then, the price began to recover and reached $0.024 by December of the same year — that is, it grew about 8.5 times.
Then came a long period of correction and flatness (movement "sideways") of the Ripple rate, lasting until March 2017, when the price of the XRP cryptocurrency was fixed at $0.0062.
Crypto boom and long correction period (2018 - 2020)
In March 2017, after a prolonged period of flatness, the Ripple cryptocurrency exchange rate began to skyrocket and reached $0.037 by early April — an increase of almost 600% in just two weeks. The reason for the growth of XRP, as well as many other digital assets, was the sharply increased popularity of cryptocurrencies. From this moment, the first large-scale crypto boom began. In May, the price of Ripple increased almost 10 times more and reached a new maximum of $0.35.
However, despite the rise of other cryptocurrencies during 2017, after the rate spike in March and May, the price of the Ripple cryptocurrency not only failed to rise but dropped slightly from $0.35 to $0.24 in December of the same year. Immediately after that, the XRP cryptocurrency rate started to rise sharply again and reached an ATH of $3.84 in early January 2018, which Ripple has still been unable to update. After reaching the new ATH, Ripple's exchange rate collapsed almost 4.5 times and, in February 2018, dropped to $0.7 amid a general collapse of assets in the crypto market caused by large and massive sell-offs. From that point, a long period of correction began in March 2020.
By August 2018, the Ripple cryptocurrency exchange rate fell to $0.28, then stayed within the range of $0.30-$0.40 until October 2019. After that, the correction continued again, with the XRP cryptocurrency exchange rate hitting a two-year low of $0.14 in March 2020 after the WHO officially announced the pandemic's start.
DeFi boom (2020 - 2021)
After the general collapse of the stock and cryptocurrency markets in March 2020 and the reduction of the U.S. Federal Reserve (Fed) key rate, investors' money again began to "flow" into the crypto market, which caused a rapid growth in the quotations of crypto assets, including Ripple.
By December 2020, the XRP cryptocurrency reached a local peak of $0.63; in April 2021, it reached a three-year high of $1.83. After a brief correction amid the general collapse of the crypto market, a second wave of growth occurred in the fall of 2021. Still, the price of Ripple was only able to reach $1.39, while several other cryptocurrencies were able to update their ATH, albeit slightly.
The fact is that after the massive DeFi boom, competition among cryptocurrencies increased significantly, with many investors switching to the decentralized finance sector, which was dominated by other major players such as:
- Ethereum,
- Binance Coin,
- Solana,
- Tron,
- Cosmos,
- Terra.
Global correction and new growth wave (2022 - 2024)
In November 2021, after a prolonged crypto rally, a new phase of correction began in the market, which led to a rapid decline in the quotes of almost all cryptocurrencies. Between November 2021 and June 2022, the price of the cryptocurrency Ripple fell from $1.25 to $0.32 — that is, it fell almost four times.
In no small part, the fall of XRP was influenced by the collapse of the Terra ecosystem in May 2021, which led to a massive sell-off in the cryptocurrency market due to fears of the collapse of related projects.
After this event, the rate of cryptocurrency XRP gradually recovered, but in the period from June 2022 to September 2024, Ripple quotes grew a little more than 1.5 times — from $0.32 to $0.53. This is despite a new wave of growth in the crypto market, which began in October 2023, during which bitcoin and some major altcoins were able to update their historical highs.
Amid the correction from July through September 2024, the XRP cryptocurrency exchange rate remained relatively stable, unlike many other cryptocurrencies. This may indicate that, for the most part, the XRP cryptocurrency has been concentrated in the hands of investors, counting on the long-term growth of the asset.