XRP Hits Record High

The price of XRP rose to a record high on Thursday, soaring past a seven-year-old milestone amid broader momentum for altcoins in the cryptocurrency market.

The Ripple Labs-linked coin was recently changing hands around $3.41, rising more than 36% over the past week, according to crypto data provider CoinGecko. The previous record was $3.40, set all the way back in January 2018.

Ethereum and Solana had also outperformed Bitcoin’s weekly 5.5% rise, with jumps of 21% and 8%, respectively.

The recent surge in XRP’s price has made it supplant Tether’s USDT as the third-largest digital asset by market capitalization. On Thursday, XRP’s total value stood above $200 billion, compared to the industry-leading stablecoin’s $160 billion footprint.

XRP’s new all-time high underscores investors’ belief in Ripple’s vision for “a regulatory-compliant blockchain for institutions,” noted Matt Kreiser, a research analyst at crypto analytics platform Messari. “It’s a validation of everything they’ve been doing and working towards.”

Created alongside XRP Ledger in 2012, XRP has facilitated cross-border and cross-currency payments longer than much of the cryptocurrency industry has existed. XRP previously peaked in 2018 near the height of the ICO boom, when Wall Street adoption was viewed as a distant hope among many market participants.

Since then, Ripple—whose founders created XRP—has helped onboard hundreds of financial institutions to XRP Ledger, from giants like Bank of America to smaller banks worldwide.

Ripple’s products aim to let firms move money more efficiently than traditional banking systems, offering higher speeds and lower costs. The company also debuted a stablecoin called Ripple USD last year, which has grown to $517 million in eight months.

The efforts to make XRP Ledger a preferred platform for issuing real-world assets on-chain, or tokenization, have been positively noted by Geoff Kendrick, Standard Chartered’s Global Head of Digital Assets Research. As more transactions move on-chain, this should enhance XRP Ledger’s throughput. The introduction of a spot XRP ETF in the U.S. could also generate newfound demand for the asset.

On Thursday, Kendrick confirmed to Decrypt that his year-end price target of $5.50 for XRP remains intact, with a strong belief that it could reach $12.25 within the next decade.

With a new all-time high established, many users believe that XRP will continue rising to $3.50, suggesting an 85% chance of this movement rather than a drop back down to $2.00. (Disclosure: Myriad is a product of Decrypt‘s parent company, DASTAN.)

Although the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission case against Ripple is still ongoing, it has effectively abandoned its lawsuit against the company regarding an alleged $1.3 billion unregistered securities offering via XRP.

Last month, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse stated on X that Ripple was dropping its cross-appeal against the SEC, effectively marking the end of the four-year legal battle. “We’re closing this chapter once and for all, and focusing on what’s most important—building the internet of value,” he remarked. “Lock in.”