Why Is XRP Dropping Today?
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XRP (CRYPTO:XRP) trades at $1.35 as of September 12, 2026, with a market capitalization of $84.65 billion. XRP has slipped 6.2% from $1.44 on September 9 and 10.0% from its late-August peak above $1.50, and now trades 0.4% below its 200-day moving average at $1.355.
XRP has dipped this week more than Bitcoin (CRYPTO:BTC), Ethereum (CRYPTO:ETH) or BNB (CRYPTO:BNB), but it leads all four cryptos in gains over 30 days. So why is XRP the worst performer over seven days and the best over 30?
XRP Fell Harder Than Bitcoin, Ethereum and BNB
XRP is down 3.1% over 24 hours and 7.1% over seven days. Bitcoin is down 1.3% in a day and 5.2% in a week, Ethereum is down 0.1% and 1.8%, and BNB is down 1.0% and 1.3%. XRP is the biggest faller of the four majors over the week to September 12.
XRP’s fall is 2.4 times Bitcoin’s in a day and 3.9 times Ethereum’s in a week. When macro traders reduce risk, XRP moves more than the rest. That’s how a high-beta asset behaves, meaning one that swings wider than the market it trades against.
Over 30 days, the ranking flips. XRP is up 32.2%, above Ethereum’s 30.2% gain, Bitcoin’s 20.9% gain, and BNB’s 16.4% gain. XRP is the best performer over 30 days and the worst over seven, and the same quality produced both.
XRP Fell 4.9% as Hike Odds Hit 83%
The September 10 PPI, the wholesale-price index that feeds consumer prices weeks later, showed wholesale inflation at 5.4% year on year. XRP fell 4.9% as Polymarket’s September hike odds moved from 62% to 70%.
The September 11 CPI printed core at 0.3% month over month against 0.2% expected, and Polymarket moved to 83% for a September 16 hike. The 10-year Treasury yield reached 4.95% on September 10, its highest in a year. When a government bond pays close to 5%, some savers move money out of coins that pay nothing, and the federal funds upper bound is already 3.75%.
Oil drove both prints. Brent crude reached $107 a barrel after US strikes on Iran resumed on September 2, and Iran’s oil exports fell to zero. Higher oil feeds gasoline, freight, and food, which feed the next CPI, which feeds the next Fed decision. XRP is at the end of that chain because it pays no yield.
Is Anyone Buying XRP Before the Fed Decides?
XRP’s funding rate hit −0.0094%, the most negative reading since June 28, 2026, per CoinGlass. A funding rate is a small payment that keeps perpetual futures aligned with the spot price, and a negative reading means short sellers are paying long holders to keep positions open.
The ETF bid stopped completely on Friday, September 11, after $12.29 million on Tuesday and $5.14 million on Wednesday. US spot Bitcoin ETFs have run four straight outflow days through September 11, so the institutional money that carried both coins through August is waiting out the Fed.
XRP’s daily Bollinger Bands, which measure how tightly the price swings around its 20-day average, had compressed into a narrow horizontal line as of September 12, 2026. The last time XRP went this quiet, it drifted sideways for 236 days before the August 31 breakout. Compression that tight means the biggest players have stopped positioning altogether.
What Would Stop XRP’s Slide?
XRP is dropping because macro traders are pricing a Federal Reserve rate hike, and XRP is the high-beta expression of that trade. The selling would ease once the Fed announces its decision at 2 p.m. Eastern on September 16. XRP’s own news has been positive, with Ripple adding AI agents to its treasury platform on September 10, and David Schwartz making bullish comments on September 9. But neither moved the XRP price.
Support runs to $1.33, 1.5% down, then $1.30 with the 20-day EMA at $1.3055, 3.7% down, then $1.23, 8.9% down. Resistance runs $1.40 to $1.41, 3.7% to 4.4% up, then $1.47 to $1.52. XRP is down because oil pushed inflation higher, which repriced the Fed to an 83% hike bet, and XRP moves more than any other major when that trade runs.
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Sam Daodu is a crypto analyst and the editor of 24/7 Wall St.'s Crypto Desk, where he covers Bitcoin, XRP, Ethereum, Solana and the altcoins investors search for most. His work focuses on price levels, spot ETF flows, on-chain data and the regulatory decisions that move crypto markets, written so a first-time buyer and a seasoned trader can both use it.
Sam has written about crypto professionally since 2019 and has published more than 2,000 articles. Before joining 24/7 Wall St., he wrote for crypto media outlets and Web3 companies and ghostwrote for crypto founders and token launches. His analysis is syndicated on Yahoo Finance, MSN and AOL and has been cited by other crypto news sites. He also founded MacLabs Marketing, a content and personal branding agency for crypto founders and executives.
When he isn't reading charts, Sam is usually at the gym or watching One Piece, a series he maintains has better tokenomics than most altcoins.
