On January 30, people who follow XRP and Ripple were talking a lot about what the price of XRP could do in the future. XRP is the main digital coin used on the XRP Ledger, a type of technology called a blockchain that helps move money quickly and with low fees. The person addressing these talks was David Schwartz, who used to be the chief technology officer of Ripple, a company that builds payments and technology for moving money across borders. He joined the discussion to share a clear way to think about big price dreams versus what the market is actually doing in real trading.
Schwartz did not promise that XRP would reach a certain price. He reminded people that he himself once thought XRP hitting a very low price, like 25 cents, would be unlikely. Still, he offered a simple way to judge online price claims. He used a basic idea from finance called expected value. This is a way to think about how valuable a bet is, based on how likely different outcomes are.
In a short post on X (the social platform where he wrote), Schwartz explained the main idea. He said that if a reasonable number of investors truly believed there was a 10% chance XRP could reach $100 in the next few years, then selling XRP for much lower prices today would not make sense. In his own words, he wrote that if many rational people believed there was a 10% chance of XRP hitting $100 someday, they wouldn’t be selling much today at prices well below $10.
Why does this matter? The logic is simple: people who think there is a real chance of a big gain should buy more now so they can benefit if the price does rise. They would slowly exhaust the available supply at lower prices as they buy more. So, if the price is currently low, and many smart investors believed in a big future gain, we would expect to see buying pressure. In other words, the market would not stay cheap for long if real investors believed strongly in a big payoff.
Schwartz also made a direct challenge to anyone who claimed XRP would reach very high prices like $100 or more without strong evidence. He suggested that online hype alone is not enough. He encouraged people to run the same kind of math themselves. He asked fans to test different probabilities and time frames to see what the price would imply about buyer and seller behavior.
The idea of expected value helps explain why some price targets feel wrong to many traders. If the chance of a big gain is really small, the expected value—the average outcome if you could repeat the situation many times—would be low. That would mean today’s price should not be high either. Schwartz’s point is that the price where XRP trades today already reflects what many investors think is likely in the future. If they believed a big move was very probable, they would act on that belief now.
Other voices in the community weighed in as well. XrpArthur, a well-known supporter, said that people who are certain XRP will reach $100 very soon probably don’t have enough money or conviction to buy a lot of XRP now. In their view, extreme price targets can hurt the way people think about the asset and make the community too optimistic without enough real money behind the ideas.
What is happening in the market today?
Right now, XRP is trading around $1.75. That price is down more than 8% in the last week and about 44% lower than a year ago. This has led some analysts to describe XRP as being in a long period of price consolidation. A consolidation phase is when the price doesn’t move up or down a lot for a long time. In this case, the period has lasted roughly 434 days, which is a long stretch of calm trading compared with more volatile times in the past.
From a technical point of view, XRP is about 25% below its 200-day moving average. A moving average is a simple way to see the general price trend by averaging past prices over a certain number of days. If the current price is below the moving average, it can suggest weakness or a lack of momentum to push the price higher in the near term. On the other hand, if price moves above a moving average, it can indicate strength. Traders watch these numbers closely to get a sense of where the price might go next.
Despite the slow price action, some positive news has appeared. In January, U.S. spot XRP exchange-traded funds (ETFs) received about $92 million in net inflows, according to data collected by SoSoValue. An ETF is a fund that lets many people invest together in a group of assets, in this case XRP. A “spot” ETF buys the actual asset, not a future contract.
At the same time, data from Santiment shows more people holding big amounts of XRP. They reported that 42 new wallets with at least one million XRP appeared since the start of 2026. A wallet is like a digital address that stores someone’s XRP. Having more wallets with large holdings can mean stronger interest from big investors, even if smaller traders are not moving the price much right now.
Looking ahead, some financial research firms have shared their own price forecasts for 2026. 21Shares published a cautious outlook with a base-case price target near $2.45. They say this would depend on factors such as continued inflows into XRP ETFs and adoption of Ripple’s stablecoin. A stablecoin is a type of cryptocurrency designed to hold a stable value, usually by linking its price to another asset like the U.S. dollar. You can learn more about stablecoins on Wikipedia.
So, when you look at the big predictions you may see online, Schwartz’s approach offers a more grounded view. Instead of chasing very high prices based on hope or hype, he invites people to think about what the market is actually doing with real money. The real test for any price forecast is how many people are willing to buy or sell today because of what they think will happen in the future. If most investors think a big move is unlikely, we should expect to see less buying pressure now. If a lot of investors believe a big move is likely, buying today would be strong and prices might rise. The market tends to reveal its beliefs through trading activity, not just through bold statements on social media.
In short, Schwartz’s message is a reminder to balance dreams with data. Price targets that are far from what the market is pricing in may sound exciting, but they do not always reflect the chance of real gains. By looking at how much people are buying today, and by using a clear framework like expected value, investors can better judge what XRP might do next. The goal is to separate helpful, thoughtful analysis from wishful thinking and online hype.
For followers of XRP and Ripple, the conversation continues. The price story is still being written by many buyers and sellers each day. The ideas of Schwartz and his supporters invite a careful look at probabilities, timing, and the money people are willing to put on the line to chase potential gains. Whether XRP will reach a new high, or stay in the current range for a longer period, will depend on how investors weigh risks, how much new money comes into XRP-focused products, and how Ripple’s broader technologies and partnerships develop over time.
Definitions
- XRP – The native digital asset used on the XRP Ledger for fast, low-cost transfers of value between parties around the world.
- XRP Ledger – A decentralized, open-source blockchain designed for fast, scalable payments. XRP is its native token and the network uses validators to reach consensus on transactions.
- Ripple – An American technology company that builds blockchain and payment tools. It has worked on speeding up cross-border payments using XRP and related tech.
- Expected value – In probability, the probability-weighted average of all possible outcomes. It helps people estimate what a future gain or price might be worth on average.
- Stablecoin – A type of cryptocurrency designed to keep a stable value, usually by tying its price to a real asset (like the U.S. dollar) and using reserves or rules to keep price swings small.
Note: This summary is based on a report about comments from Ripple’s former CTO and related market data. The numbers and statements reflect information available at the time of reporting and may change as new data comes in.