XRP Price Forecast: XRP USD Holds Around $1.94 After 19% Slide From January Highs

Ripple XRP-USD price structure and trading context

XRP-USD is trading around 1.94–1.95 dollars on 22 January 2026 after a sharp bounce that added roughly 4.5 percent in one day and about 3 percent over recent sessions. The move comes after a six-month drawdown of roughly forty-four percent and about thirty-eight percent loss over the last year, while the three-year and five-year performance remains extremely positive at roughly three hundred eighty-nine percent and six hundred thirty-four percent respectively. Daily turnover has exploded to roughly 3.96 billion XRP against an average near 138 million, which is a regime shift in activity rather than a routine session and signals that large players are repositioning around this zone near 1.94 dollars.

Short-term XRP-USD performance around 1.94 dollars

At the spot level XRP-USD is oscillating just below the 2.00 dollar psychological line, closing the day near 1.9431 dollars, with intraday performance showing a gain of about 4.53 percent. Over the very short horizon XRP has recovered from an intraday low near the upper 1.80s and is now sitting in the upper half of its recent range defined by 1.70 dollars on the downside and 2.17 dollars on the upside. Year to date XRP-USD is up roughly 5.1 percent, which is modest compared with its longer-term history but meaningful considering the deep correction suffered in 2024 and early 2025. The current candle structure shows follow-through buying rather than a single spike, but the rebound is still operating inside a broader downtrend that started after the last major high above 3.60 dollars.

Sentiment for XRP-USD: extreme fear after nineteen percent retreat from January peak

From the early January high XRP has dropped roughly nineteen percent, which has pushed crowd sentiment into what on-chain analytics classify as extreme fear. Retail commentary across major social channels has flipped from optimism to outright pessimism, with smaller traders reducing dip-buying and many stepping aside. That withdrawal of retail liquidity means price is being driven more by larger, patient flows and derivatives desks rather than by short-term speculative noise. Historically such extreme fear readings have often appeared close to local bottoms rather than tops, because they show that weak hands have already capitulated. At the same time similar sentiment structures were visible in early 2022 before XRP slid from roughly 0.78 dollars toward 0.30 dollars, so extreme fear alone is not a timing signal; it simply confirms that the market is emotionally stretched to the downside and highly sensitive to new catalysts.

Institutional demand drivers: one billion dollar Evernorth XRP treasury and AI agents on XRPL

On the structural side Evernorth is raising more than 1 billion dollars to build what it targets as the world’s largest institutional XRP digital asset treasury. The strategy is not passive accumulation; the plan is to use XRP across institutional lending, liquidity provision and DeFi strategies directly on the XRP Ledger, with returns generated by active deployment rather than simple buy and hold. To execute this at scale Evernorth is partnering with infrastructure provider t54 to deploy AI-driven treasury agents that handle verification, risk assessment and compliance while interacting programmatically with XRPL and DeFi venues. This matters for price because it anchors XRP inside a long-term institutional balance sheet rather than pure speculative wallets, and it ties demand to balance-sheet management and liquidity services. The presence of a structured 1 billion dollar accumulation and deployment program offsets part of the cyclical weakness in spot trading, even if the buying is phased and not fully visible in a single day’s tape.

Spot XRP ETF flows: heavy outflows from legacy products and selective inflows elsewhere

ETF flows are currently a headwind rather than a tailwind. Since the start of the year spot XRP products have already recorded two days of net outflows. Around 7 January roughly 40.80 million dollars exited XRP ETFs. More recently, on 20 January, net outflows reached about 53.32 million dollars, the largest daily withdrawal since launch. The bulk of that move came from a legacy product, with more than 55.39 million dollars redeemed from a large GXRP trust, while newer vehicles such as XRPZ attracted only about 2.07 million dollars of fresh money. For price this means that some long-duration institutional holders are de-risking or rotating while other funds are selectively adding exposure. As long as ETF flows remain net negative they will counteract part of the spot and derivatives demand, and they help explain why XRP continues to struggle to hold levels above 2 dollars despite occasional short squeezes.

Derivatives positioning and open interest: cautious accumulation, not manic leverage

The derivatives structure around XRP is sending a mixed but informative signal. On one side open interest in XRP futures and perpetuals on major venues has dropped toward roughly 3.35 billion dollars, the lowest reading since the first trading day of 2026, which confirms that a large portion of speculative leverage has already been flushed out. On the other side a more detailed look at a major exchange shows open interest near 566.5 million dollars, running above its 30-day moving average of roughly 528.8 million dollars, while the 30-day standard deviation of open interest has climbed toward 65.7 million dollars, the highest since November. That pattern describes new positions entering the market at a measured pace, with volatility in positioning increasing but without the blow-off spikes seen during earlier speculative phases. A leverage Z-score around 0.57 shows that the system is not in a regime of extreme leverage or crowded one-sided bets. In plain terms this is a cautious accumulation phase coupled with early preparation for a larger move, rather than an already-crowded momentum trade that must unwind immediately.

Technical indicators for XRP-USD: strong trend strength versus stretched momentum

The short-term indicator set is clearly extended but still consistent with an active trend. The relative strength index around 66.7 is in overbought territory and warns that the current leg higher is running hot and vulnerable to a pullback or consolidation. The stochastic oscillator near 76.3 supports the same message and confirms that short-term traders have already chased price aggressively from the recent lows. At the same time the average directional index around 34.9 indicates that the underlying trend is strong; once direction is chosen, price tends to move in that direction for a while rather than chopping aimlessly. The MACD configuration is more nuanced: the line near minus 0.03, the signal around minus 0.08 and a histogram around 0.05 show that downside momentum has weakened and turned slightly positive, but the shift is still fragile and can reverse quickly if new selling pressure appears. Taken together these readings show a market where trend strength is real, but the recent bounce is already crowded in the very short term, making timing critical for fresh entries.

Support and resistance map for XRP-USD between 1.61 and 3.67 dollars

The current battle in XRP-USD is unfolding inside a well-defined structural range. On the downside the first major support zone sits around 1.70 dollars, which coincides with the lower Bollinger Band and marks roughly a twelve and a half percent drop from the current price. A deeper support level near 1.61 dollars, the year low, represents the threshold where the market would effectively admit that the latest bounce has failed and a fresh leg of capitulation is underway. On the upside the immediate pivot is the 1.94–2.00 dollar band, where both a high-volume node and the dense clustering of recent closes suggest tight two-way trade. Just above that, the 50-day moving average near 2.01 dollars forms a psychological trigger; sustained closes above this line would signal that short-term control is shifting back to buyers. The first real resistance is around 2.17 dollars, aligned with the upper Bollinger Band, and failure there would reinforce the idea that this is still a range environment. Higher up, 2.50 dollars is a natural round-number barrier, followed by the 200-day moving average near 2.56 dollars, which separates recovery attempts from full trend reversals. If these levels are broken and held, the next structural target becomes the year high around 3.67 dollars, where medium-term sellers previously emerged.

Medium and long-term XRP-USD projections and scenario analysis

Model-based projections for XRP-USD span a wide range and underline how volatile forward price discovery remains. On the downside shorter-term forecast paths point toward zones around 1.69 dollars on a one-month horizon and 1.66 dollars on a quarterly basis, consistent with a scenario where overbought readings resolve through a retracement rather than immediate breakout. On the upside one-year projections cluster around 4.33 dollars, which would represent roughly one hundred twenty-three percent upside versus 1.94 dollars, provided that adoption, regulatory clarity and overall crypto liquidity evolve in a constructive manner. Three-year and five-year scenario paths stretching toward 7.09 dollars and 9.84 dollars assume that XRP continues to operate as a core settlement and liquidity asset within a broad ecosystem of institutions, fintechs and DeFi protocols. The gap between the near-term downside levels near the high 1 dollar region and the long-term upside above 7 dollars simply quantifies the risk profile: near-term outcomes are extremely path-dependent, while long-term outcomes depend on whether current structural initiatives such as treasuries, ETFs and real-world use cases scale beyond the early stages.

Holder structure and cycle comparison: echoes of early 2022 with important differences

On-chain distribution data show that the holder structure of XRP is starting to resemble the pattern seen in early 2022, just before a multi-month decline. Newer participants who accumulated during the last one week to one month period have cost bases below those of holders who entered between six and twelve months ago, meaning that some medium-term investors are currently under water while very recent buyers are closer to break-even. In the previous cycle a similar configuration around 0.78 dollars preceded a slide toward roughly 0.30 dollars, as medium-term holders capitulated and sold into weakness. The difference now is that the market is simultaneously seeing the rise of structured vehicles such as spot XRP ETFs and large treasuries including the 1 billion dollar Evernorth fund, which did not exist in that earlier episode. That institutional layer can dampen the magnitude and speed of forced selling because not all exposure is held by short-horizon traders, but it does not immunize the market from drawdowns if macro risk sentiment deteriorates or if regulatory shocks reappear. The current configuration therefore combines a historically bearish retail pattern with a more resilient institutional base, which can translate into prolonged sideways regimes followed by sharp directional breaks once consensus finally aligns.

Ripple XRP-USD trading stance: Hold with tactical bias rather than aggressive chase

From a risk-reward perspective the current data set supports a Hold stance on XRP-USD, with a tactical bias rather than an aggressive chase. The case for upside is clear: price has reclaimed the high 1.90s, the trend strength indicated by the ADX is solid, volume near 3.96 billion confirms that real capital is involved, modelled one-year targets near 4.33 dollars leave substantial headroom, derivatives positioning reflects measured accumulation rather than reckless leverage, and long-term structures such as the 1 billion dollar Evernorth treasury and the ETF complex add depth to the ownership base. The argument for caution is equally explicit: sentiment remains in extreme fear after a nineteen percent retreat from the January high, short-term momentum gauges are overbought with RSI above 66, spot ETFs have just registered their largest outflow on record near 53.32 million dollars, a break below 1.70 dollars would reopen the path toward the 1.61 dollar low, and historical analogues like 2022 show that similar configurations have led to extended weakness when no fresh catalyst emerged. Under these conditions the rational positioning is to treat XRP as a Hold at current levels, with tactical buying only on clean retests of the 1.70–1.80 dollar support band and willingness to trim into strength near the 2.17–2.56 dollar resistance zone until price either secures sustained closes above the 200-day average around 2.56 dollars or breaks below 1.61 dollars, which would invalidate the recovery thesis and shift the stance toward Sell.

That's TradingNEWS