Is It Good to Buy Ripple (XRP) Now Since It’s So Cheap?

XRP (CRYPTO:XRP) trades near $1.11, after dropping by nearly 40% this year, though the price has steadied over the past month with a 1.3% gain. The last time the XRP price traded near its current level was mid-November 2024, when it crossed $1.12 on the way up. 

Donald Trump had just won the election, traders were pricing in a crypto-friendly administration, and XRP more than doubled to $2.52 three weeks after climbing above $1.11. It kept climbing until July 2025, when it peaked at $3.65, more than tripling from that November level.

XRP is back at that price today, except it has been steadily declining all year rather than rising. With XRP this cheap, is now a good time to buy?

Where the XRP Price Stands After a 70% Fall

XRP’s decline began with a crash on October 10 last year, when Trump announced 100% tariffs on Chinese imports and triggered the largest liquidation event in crypto history, wiping $19 billion off the market in a single day. XRP fell with the rest of the market and traded near $1.85 by the end of 2025.

XRP recovered briefly in January, climbing to $2.40 in the first week, and that remains its peak this year. The XRP price has been declining since then, sliding to around $2.00 by February, $1.24 by the second quarter, and dropped by more than 20% in June reaching a low near $1.03 late in the month.

At $1.11 today, XRP is about 70% below its July 2025 peak, with a market cap of roughly $69.2 billion. The escalating conflict between the U.S. and Iran and uncertainty over interest rates have sent investors out of crypto and into safer assets all year, and Bitcoin (CRYPTO:BTC) has fallen about 25% in that time. XRP dropped considerably because Ripple’s wins kept bypassing the coin, with tokenized assets on the XRP Ledger growing 388% this year while Ripple’s biggest deals settled in RLUSD rather than in XRP.

Ripple’s escrow releases also add to the pressure. The company frees up to a billion XRP each month and locks most of it back up, but a few hundred million coins still reach circulation. More coins in the market means more money is needed to lift the price, so XRP has to attract fresh demand simply to hold its level.

The Signs XRP Is Near a Bottom

Market bottoms usually mark periods where sellers run out of coins to sell, leverage disappears, and the largest holders start buying while everyone else looks away. And XRP is showing signs of a bottom right now.

Coins have been leaving exchanges all year, with XRP held on trading platforms dropping to about 1.6 billion, which is a seven-year low and roughly half the 3.76 billion held on exchanges last October. Holders tend to move coins onto exchanges when they plan to sell them, so a shrinking supply means fewer sellers waiting.

Moreover, XRP whales have been buying steadily. Those holding between 100,000 and 100 million XRP added about 600 million XRP over five weeks, worth about $670 million, according to Santiment. Those wallets already hold roughly a third of the circulating supply, so the group with the most XRP to lose is adding rather than selling.

XRP derivatives open interest, which is the total value of leveraged bets still running, has also collapsed from $15 billion in February to about $1.91 billion, an 87% drop. The traders who wanted to bet on the way down have already made and closed those bets, which is what the end of a decline looks like rather than the start of one.

However, none of this brings in demand for XRP. Coins have been leaving exchanges since October and leverage started draining in February, and XRP fell through both. These conditions describe a market that has run out of sellers, and that is not the same as one that has found buyers.

How High Could XRP Go?

From XRP’s current price of $1.11, a move back to $2 would be an 80% gain, and reclaiming the July 2025 high at $3.65 would take a 3.3x. Two things could decide how high the XRP price goes within a year.

The first is whether money returns to crypto at all, and the second is whether institutions can finally buy XRP in size. U.S. inflation fell 0.4% in June, which is the biggest monthly drop since April 2020, and the Federal Reserve could start cutting interest rates if that continues. Lower rates push investors back into riskier assets, and XRP would climb with the market the same way it fell with it this year.

The CLARITY Act would settle the second. It would define XRP as a digital commodity in federal law, replacing the joint interpretive guidance the SEC and CFTC issued in March, which any future administration could withdraw. Large institutions have been waiting for that permanence, and the spot XRP ETFs launched last November give their money somewhere to go.

If the bill becomes law and market sentiment improves with Bitcoin and altcoins rallying, XRP could reach $2 to $3 by this time next year, which would be a gain of 80% to 170%. And if the bill’s passage ignites a bullish market frenzy, XRP could climb as high as $5.

Is Now a Good Time to Buy XRP?

XRP looks closer to a bottom than a top. Sellers have run out, the largest holders are buying, and leverage has drained away, which is the setup that tends to come before a recovery rather than another leg down.

However, XRP still needs demand to show up and buyers are waiting on the CLARITY Act. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said on July 23 that he does not expect the bill to pass before the August 7 recess, which pushes the earliest realistic window to September, with the midterm campaign closing in behind it.

Whether buying $1.11 turns out to be a cheap entry point depends on the CLARITY Act, and the bill’s passage is still far from certain.

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