Ripple, the cryptocurrency backed by some banks in Asia and elsewhere for facilitating transactions, continues its relentless rise. The XRP coins, which dived to $0.82 just before Christmas, have quadrupled in value. XRP/USD reached a new high of $3.24 and is back to $3.14 at the time of writing. On the day, Ripple is up some 15%, extending the previous gains.
Looking at the broader cryptocurrency world, Ripple’s market cap is already flirting with $150 billion. Just around a week ago, it battled and won against Ethereum for second place, when both coins had a market cap of around $75 billion. Ripple is now worth double.
And what about the No. 1 spot? Bitcoin remains the king of the hill, but the rapid clip in which Ripple is rising does not make a potential “flippening” unthinkable. Bitcoin’s price has been stuck and its shine has been lost. We have seen how bad publicity is bad news for bitcoin. This wasn’t the case throughout 2017.
So, with another surge of Ripple and bitcoin stuck at around 60%, the market cap of the Ripple is now worth around 60% that of bitcoin. Ripple would need another 60% gain in order to reach bitcoin’s current valuation, but stranger things have happened.
Here is how it looks on the hourly chart. After crossing the $3 level, the next round level is $4. There are few real technical barriers at this unchartered territory for XRP/dollar.
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