XRP Price Forecast – XRP-USD fights to hold the $1.30–$1.40 zone after a brutal 60% crash

XRP-USD – 2026 selloff drags price back toward 2024 lows

XRP-USD short-term price action and Trump-era gains now erased

XRP-USD has moved from hype to stress in a few months. From a peak around $3.60 in July 2025, price is now trading in the $1.30–$1.40 band, down more than 60% from that high. In the last month alone, XRP slid from roughly $2.41 on January 5 to around $1.35–$1.40, a drawdown of more than 40%. The latest leg lower has been violent. Daily losses of 7–15% pushed XRP from above $1.50 to the low $1.30s, marking the weakest levels since late 2024 if you strip out the October flash crash. The market that once priced in a Trump-era crypto boom now trades as if that premium never existed.

Macro shock, Kevin Warsh and a stronger dollar crushing XRP-USD

The current phase is not an XRP-only story. The macro backdrop flipped risk assets into reverse. The nomination of Kevin Warsh as incoming Fed chair signalled a more hawkish stance. Expectations of balance sheet reduction and higher-for-longer rates drove the dollar sharply higher and pushed real yields up. A firmer dollar historically bleeds into weaker crypto, and this time is no exception. Bitcoin dropped back toward the $70,000 area, its lowest since late 2024, and that move broke a key psychological floor for the whole complex. XRP, a high-beta token relative to BTC, amplified that macro move. When the dollar climbs and the Fed leans restrictive, capital rotates out of speculative risk. XRP-USD is on the wrong side of that rotation until policy expectations ease or the dollar turns.

Leverage washout and XRP-USD derivatives reset

The latest XRP-USD slump is driven as much by positioning as by news. Before the drop, derivatives data showed built-up speculative longs, with traders leaning on leverage after every bounce. Once price failed to hold above the mid-$1.50 zone and broke the late-January low near $1.51, stop-loss clusters went, forced selling accelerated and liquidation flows hit the order book. At the same time, a parallel washout across Bitcoin and Ethereum triggered roughly three-quarters of a billion dollars in crypto liquidations in a short window. That cross-asset flush removed a large portion of leveraged longs in XRP and dragged open interest down to multi-month lows. The important nuance is the character of the unwind. A big part of the exposure exited via voluntary closing of positions rather than cascading margin calls. That is more consistent with a structural reset than with outright panic.

On-chain behaviour and whale activity around XRP-USD

On-chain metrics confirm the idea of a reset rather than a capitulation spike. Large holders are not rushing to exit, but they are also not stepping in to buy aggressively. Whale accumulation has stayed muted during the slide, with no clear surge in big wallet inflows at current levels. That absence of heavy buying means there is no obvious strong-hand base forming yet around $1.30–$1.40. In earlier cycles, durable bottoms in XRP-USD were often accompanied by visible whale absorption, where big wallets soaked up supply while derivatives interest collapsed. Today, one part of that pattern is present, the leverage flush, but the other leg, decisive accumulation, is missing. Until large holders either capitulate or start building positions in size, the market will likely trade as a drifting, headline-driven tape rather than a clear reversal structure.

Sentiment, “XRP scam” searches and narrative drag on XRP-USD

Behavioural factors are adding pressure on top of macro and positioning. During every strong XRP-USD rally, search interest in phrases like “XRP scam” and “Ripple scam” spikes. Those trends typically align with peak momentum and often precede pullbacks. That shows how narrative turns against XRP when price runs too far too fast. The same dynamic works in reverse when the market falls. Negative headlines around crypto draw more attention to XRP’s past regulatory battles and to recycled claims about structural risk. Retail players who joined late see those narratives at the same time as their unrealised losses deepen. That mix weighs on confidence at exactly the moment when the market needs patient capital to step in. The underlying adoption story around XRP Ledger and cross-border payments has not collapsed, but right now it is sentiment and search behaviour that drive marginal flows, not fundamentals.

Technical structure for XRP-USD – key supports and invalidation levels

Technically, XRP-USD has transitioned from a choppy range to a clean downtrend channel. Price has been trading inside a falling channel for months, rejecting the midline on the last bounce and sliding toward the lower boundary. The current zone around $1.30–$1.40 is a high-confluence demand area. It lines up with the September–November 2021 breakout region, the 2025 trough and the lower band of the multi-month channel. As long as XRP-USD holds above roughly $1.34 on a daily closing basis, this area can still act as a short-term stabiliser. If that floor breaks decisively, the next technical magnets are clear. First, the $1.25–$1.26 band, which marks the October 2025 flash-crash lows. Below that, the May 2021 low near $1.10 comes into view. Deeper out, there is an ultra-bearish extension that points back toward the $0.50–$0.55 zone, which would represent a full retrace of most of the Trump-era run. On the upside, there is no credible bullish setup while XRP-USD trades below roughly $1.51, the late-January swing low now turned resistance. A daily close back above $1.51 would be the first sign that selling pressure is exhausted. Only a sustained move above about $2.20, where the 200-day moving average is clustered, would flip the medium-term structure from bearish to constructive.

XRP-USD relative to Bitcoin, Ethereum and the broader crypto crash

The selloff in XRP-USD cannot be read in isolation. The entire market is repricing. Bitcoin has fallen for several days in a row, testing $70,000–$71,000 and finally violating the $74,000 support that held for months. That break unlocked targets down toward the 200-week moving average in the high-$60,000 area and possibly lower in a stress scenario. Ethereum has dropped to around $2,050–$2,100, testing supports last visited in mid-2025. Dogecoin is fighting to hold the $0.10 zone, near the weakest levels since late 2024. Broad liquidations have driven more than $770 million in forced closures in a single day, following a prior $2.2 billion wipeout event at the start of February. In that environment, high-beta assets like XRP-USD are used as liquidity sources. When managers need to cut risk fast, they sell what still has depth and relative outperformance versus microcaps. XRP fits that profile. The result is a drawdown that is sharper than Bitcoin’s but consistent with its role as a leveraged play on the sector.

Medium-term scenarios for XRP-USD – base, bleed or capitulation

From here, the structure points to three broad paths. The first is a grinding base. In that scenario, XRP-USD defends the $1.30–$1.40 area, volatility compresses, open interest stays low and whales gradually start to accumulate. Price would then build a sideways range, likely capped below $1.70–$1.80, before any attempt at a sustained recovery. The second is a controlled bleed. In that outcome, the current demand zone gives way, price works down through $1.25 toward $1.10 and the market forms a bottom only when macro pressure eases or when Bitcoin finds a clear floor. That is consistent with the current absence of aggressive dip-buying from large holders. The third scenario is a true capitulation spike, where some external shock or sudden regulatory headline forces a vertical flush, pushes XRP-USD into the $0.50–$0.60 band and, only then, triggers deep-value buying and a faster rebound. At the moment, price action, derivatives and on-chain data look closer to the second path than to a full panic or a clean base.

Regulation, narratives and the structural story behind XRP-USD

Regulatory risk still shadows XRP-USD even after earlier legal milestones reduced some of the existential overhang. Courts, regulators and politicians remain divided on the correct treatment of crypto assets, and each new case or policy proposal can change the risk premium investors demand. That uncertainty interacts with search behaviour and media coverage. During bull phases, every small positive headline gets magnified, and XRP is presented as a beneficiary of friendlier policy. During drawdowns, past disputes and negative narratives resurface, even when the underlying legal position has not changed materially. The long-term thesis around XRP as a tool for cross-border settlement and institutional grade flows remains intact on paper. The problem is that markets discount near-term volatility, funding stress and the opportunity cost of capital much more heavily than optional future utility when policy is unclear and macro is hostile.

Verdict on XRP-USD – stance on buy, sell or hold

Given current conditions, the stance on XRP-USD is bearish. The chart is in a confirmed downtrend with lower highs and lower lows. Price is trading near the lower boundary of a falling channel, below the late-January pivot at $1.51 and far under the $2.20 band that would signal a genuine trend change. Macro remains hostile, with a strong dollar, restrictive Fed expectations and risk assets under pressure. Positioning has reset in a healthy way on the derivatives side, but whale accumulation is still absent, which means there is no clear strong-hand floor. Sentiment is fragile, with negative narratives dominating search behaviour on every bounce. On that profile, XRP-USD does not justify fresh exposure at current levels for anyone who needs risk to be tightly controlled. The setup fits a Sell view with a bearish bias as long as price holds below about $1.50, with any reassessment only if XRP-USD can reclaim and hold above the $2.20 zone on convincing volume.

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