- On the 14th of April 2021, XRP’s price reached $1.96 for the first time since December 2017. This startling rise surprised many crypto investors because Ripple, the company behind XRP, is still in the process of settling its ongoing legal dispute with the Securities & Exchanges Commission (SEC) that began mid-December 2020.
- Soon after, we saw a roughly 130% sell-off towards $0.85. Fortunately, the price has recovered quite considerably as it looks towards the $1.96 area again. At the time of writing, one XRP is worth $1.61.
- Investors will be keeping an eye on when the legal issue between Ripple and the SEC will conclude, a time that looks indefinite at this point. Moreover, the brand is aiming towards going public once the dust has settled.
XRP, a coin that’s been one of the ‘The Big Three’ in crypto for several years, has had quite an eventful journey over the last six months. Towards the end of November 2020, the project was trading around $0.83. However, by the end of the year, it plummeted to $0.17.
As it’s already well known, the drop was largely due to the SEC’s lawsuit against Ripple towards late December 2020. The allegations were the firm held a $1.3 billion unregistered securities sale; hence, the SEC believes XRP should be classed as security with their agency rather than a decentralized currency like Bitcoin or Ethereum.
The markets responded accordingly to the negative news, but since the start of 2021, the coin has surprisingly climbed back over and above the $0.83 mark, more than double this price as it reached $1.96 for the first time in over three years.
XRP fundamental outlook
The overarching fundamental theme that’s been making headlines for XRP is, of course, Ripple’s legal dispute with the SEC. This has been the main topic from a fundamental perspective for months.
Unfortunately, as with many legal matters in most countries, there is no expected date when a settlement could occur. It has already been close to five months, and still, everything is in limbo.
Despite all this controversy, investors seemed to have not stayed away from the coin, nonetheless, based on the impressive gains it has made. On a positive note, Ripple founders have suggested a desire for their company to have an IPO (initial coin offering) in the future once the dust has settled.
XRP technical outlook
Without using any indicators, it’s clear to see on most time frames that XRP’s trajectory is firmly on the upside. Another critical element to look at regarding price is momentum. At this present moment, using the RSI (Relative Strength Index), momentum is extremely bullish on the weekly and monthly charts.
This evidence suggests traders are still holding onto their coins or positions, probably anticipating for the market to test its previous $1.96 high, assuming no negative news comes out in the interim.
On lower time frames, we don’t really see any signs of a potential sell-off because of the overwhelmingly bullish momentum. Traders will note the supply zone at the $1.96 level.
However, if the market did reach this area again, it is unlikely to cause an immediate drop. It would take at least a month or longer before any bears can make any big selling suggestion.
Regardless, we should not rule out that most of the big cryptos could, at any moment, get into serious reversal territory especially considering how expensive Bitcoin already is.
Where to from here?
Despite its current legal battles and naysayers, XRP continues to hold its position in the top 5 or 10 of most traded cryptocurrencies, a factor that’s partly contributed to its success. For the time being, things are looking buoyant for one of the world’s leading payment protocols.
We’ll have to see wait and see what the price action and other fundamental data will suggest in the near term.