XRP price maintains a sideways trend on Monday, showing a minor 0.30% gain, following a weekly loss of 3.74%. The upcoming pivotal date in the SEC vs. Ripple lawsuit is February 12, marking the end of the remedies-related discovery period. Legal expert John Deaton suggests that Ripple could present an exemption for the majority of institutional sales, potentially influencing the outcome of the lawsuit.
In the ongoing SEC vs. Ripple lawsuit, XRP price has been impacted significantly. A crucial ruling in July declared that XRP was not a security by itself, providing a key victory for Ripple. The latest development involves the SEC’s motion to compel Ripple to disclose detailed financial statements for 2022 and 2023, along with post-complaint contracts governing XRP sales to institutional investors. Ripple strongly opposes this motion, citing factual mischaracterizations by the regulator’s lawyers.
Investors holding XRP are eagerly awaiting the February 12 deadline for the conclusion of the remedies-related discovery. Legal expert Bill Morgan anticipates that Judge Analisa Torres will rule on the motion before the deadline. Additionally, attorney John Deaton suggests in a recent YouTube video that Ripple could potentially settle the lawsuit by paying nearly $10 million.
Deaton points out that Ripple might demonstrate that the majority of its institutional sales were to accredited investors, potentially exempting them from Section 5 of the Securities Act. He predicts that Judge Torres is likely to impose a fine significantly less than Ripple’s $200 million legal fees, suggesting a possible fine of $10 million.
Technical Analysis: XRP’s short-term outlook appears bearish, with a potential retest of support at $0.468 before initiating a recovery from the $0.532 support line. Once these conditions are met, a bullish long-term outlook is expected, with XRP aiming for a target of $0.696 to the upside.
XRP/USDT 1-day chart
A retest of the $0.468 support level and a failure to bounce from it could signal weakness in the trend and invalidate the bullish thesis. XRP price could crash nearly 18% and hit the $0.379 support.
CRYPTOCURRENCY METRICS FAQS
What is circulating supply?
The developer or creator of each cryptocurrency decides on the total number of tokens that can be minted or issued. Only a certain number of these assets can be minted by mining, staking or other mechanisms. This is defined by the algorithm of the underlying blockchain technology. Since its inception, a total of 19,445,656 BTCs have been mined, which is the circulating supply of Bitcoin. On the other hand, circulating supply can also be decreased via actions such as burning tokens, or mistakenly sending assets to addresses of other incompatible blockchains.
What is market capitalization?
Market capitalization is the result of multiplying the circulating supply of a certain asset by the asset’s current market value. For Bitcoin, the market capitalization at the beginning of August 2023 is above $570 billion, which is the result of the more than 19 million BTC in circulation multiplied by the Bitcoin price around $29,600.
What is trading volume?
Trading volume refers to the total number of tokens for a specific asset that has been transacted or exchanged between buyers and sellers within set trading hours, for example, 24 hours. It is used to gauge market sentiment, this metric combines all volumes on centralized exchanges and decentralized exchanges. Increasing trading volume often denotes the demand for a certain asset as more people are buying and selling the cryptocurrency.
What is funding rate?
Funding rates are a concept designed to encourage traders to take positions and ensure perpetual contract prices match spot markets. It defines a mechanism by exchanges to ensure that future prices and index prices periodic payments regularly converge. When the funding rate is positive, the price of the perpetual contract is higher than the mark price. This means traders who are bullish and have opened long positions pay traders who are in short positions. On the other hand, a negative funding rate means perpetual prices are below the mark price, and hence traders with short positions pay traders who have opened long positions.
