Once Upon a Time xrp was seen as the future of cryptocurrency millions of people still believe this today so it's no surprised that it tends to see incredible gains when the crypto bull market comes around what is surprising is how much xrp has rallied in recent weeks and this has even the non-believers wondering whether xrp could in fact be the future of crypto and what this could mean for its price and that's why today we're going to do a deep dive into xrp I bring you up to speed on what it's been up to reveal why it's been pumping and tell you how high it could go in the coming months stay tuned I'll start by saying that nothing in this video is financial advice it's purely educational content that's intended to inform you about xrp and I'll also note that nobody at the team coin Bureau holds xrp as part of their portfolio at the time of posting so you can trust that our anal is will be as objective as possible as always with that said it's been a long time since we've done a proper Deep dive into xrp on the main channel so we reckon a little refresher is in order xrp was founded in 2012 by software Engineers Arthur Britto David Schwarz and Jed MCB back then xrp was still known as Ripple around the time that xrp's main net was launched the trio founded a company called opencoin and added Chris Larson as the fourth co-founder in 2013 opencoin rebranded to Ripple which created quite a bit of confusion obviously people would refer to Ripple the crypto and ripple the company as if they were one in the same thing this was a double-edged sword as the activities of Ripple the company are arguably what made Ripple the crypto so successful in its early days but this also attracted regulatory scrutiny of course that's because Ripple the crypto looked like a stock in Ripple the company even though this technically wasn't correct uh to clear up any confusion Ripple the crypto rebranded to xrp in 2018 fortunately or unfortunately xrp is still referred to as Ripple today by many people and platforms now this is where things get interesting contrary to popular belief there was never an Ico for xrp instead 80% of xrp's initial and maximum supply of 100 billion was gifted to Ripple in 2012 the remaining 20% was split among three of Ripple's four co-founders 9. 5 billion xrp went to Jed 9. 5 billion went to Chris and 1 billion went to Arthur Jed infamously sold all his xrp during the last crypto bull market onchain analysis suggests Chris has sold around 8.
3 billion so far with news reports suggesting he sold 4 billion back in 2021 it seems Arthur sold all his xrp very early on possibly sometime in 2013 as for David he was offered 500 million xrp but instead opted for a 2% stake in Ripple and David has since remarked on many occasions that he regrets not taking the xrp the Silver Lining is that Ripple's valuation reportedly stands at around 11 billion making David's 2% stake worth roughly 202 million so he's not crying about it under the hood xrp uses a consensus mechanism simply called consensus which involves processing transactions in the order they come in xrp's novel consensus mechanism makes it possible to process up to 1,500 transactions per second with a 3 to5 second finality which was actually quite Lightning Fast back in the day as with all modern-day cryptos with high TPS scores xrp speed is fundamentally due to its relative centralization even though xrp has over 10 active validators most transactions are processed by a set of just 35 validators known as the unique node list or UNL and this is managed by The xrp Ledger Foundation an Estonian nonprofit first established in 2020 that oversees xrp's ongoing development notably xrp validators do not need to stake or lock xrp to process transactions nor do they earn transaction fees for doing so validated selection is based on trust and reputation uh hence the UNL what's fascinating is that this setup technically makes it possible for you to choose which xrp validators to use even more notably wallets currently need to hold a minimum of one xrp as a reserve and transaction fees on xrp are burned and this has the Practical effect of restricting xrp's Supply though this effect is minimal with 6 million accounts on The xrp Ledger and just over 13 million xrp burned these features have restricted less than 1% of xrp's total Supply which is negligible as far as utility goes xrp's original purpose was to be used as a bridge currency in the products and services provided by Ripple today known as Ripple labs in short an asset like the US dollar could be swapped for xrp at a US bank and then this xrp could be swapped for Swiss Franks at a Swiss bank the Practical effect of this was that you could trans ER assets instantly around the world namely currencies the possibility that xrp could become this standard for transferring assets instantly around the world is precisely why it continues to be popular with narratives like xrp being the next Swift the fact that this was been done primarily via Banks is also why xrp was so hated by DieHard crypto believers who labeled xrp and similar cryptos as Banker coins there's also xrp use of the iso 222 interoperability standard for payments but uh let's not go down that rabbit hole now over the last couple of years xrp's utility has expanded and the crypto project has been slowly turning its focus towards retail the same is arguably true of Ripple labs and this pivot to retail has created a bit of controversy within the xrp community because most xrp holders bought because of the institutional aspects not the retail aspects and as you'll see this pivot could be rocket fuel for xrp's price and by the way guys if you enjoying this video so far be sure to smash that like button to let us know and subscribe to the channel and ping the notification Bell to make sure you don't miss the next one now back to xrp's Pivot to retail in retrospect it's possible that this began as early as 2019 when a company called xrpl Labs was incorporated in the Netherlands a close followers of xrp will know that xrpl Labs is the company behind zamon which appears to be xrp's most popular functional wallet by functional I mean that it's used for more than just storing and transferring xrp the zamon wallet is quickly becoming the de facto front end for xrp's entire ecosystem as such you could say that zamon is analogous to crypto wallets like metam mosque and zon's website notes that it has 1 million downloads so far and this is where things get interesting yet again even though xrp has a very large community this isn't really reflected on chain in case you missed it there are only around 6 million Wallets on The xrp Ledger this isn't very impressive given that xrp has been around for a decade but let's set that aside for now this suggests that most xrp holders are holding their xrp on exchanges which is the case for many cryptos xrp lab's founder vit vent realized this disconnect between xrp community and its onchain activity very early on and he's basically been looking to close that Gap with products like zamon ever since there's only one small problem though and that's that xrp itself isn't very programmable in other words xrp doesn't have the same kind of smart contract functionality that cryptos like ethereum have as another fun fact etherium Creator vitalic buan almost became an intern at Ripple Labs back in the day naturally he pitched add in smart contracts to xrp to David and the other devs David has noted in many interviews and presentations that they didn't add smart contracts to xrp because they were concerned it would create the same high fees and congestion issues you see on ethereum and salana respectively not only that but it's easy to forget the era in which xrp started back when xrp began crypto's Focus was institutional adoption and that's just because there were essentially zero retail investors in crypto much less users put differently the institutional Market was exponentially larger than the retail Market as the years went on however it became clear that institutions weren't interested in adopting public and permissionless cryptos they just wanted to copy the underlying technology to create private and permissioned blockchains at the same time the number of crypto retail investors and users grew rapidly it seems that XMP stakeholders got the memo sometime in 2023 and this is when a series of amendments were made to The xrp Ledger to improve its programmability such as enhanced amm functions however it didn't take long to realize that xrp would need to make more drastic changes than minor amendments and David admitted in an interview earlier this year that these amendments weren't meeting the demand of users and this is presumably why an evm compatible side chain to xrp was introduced xrp's evm side chain was first revealed in late 2020 3 and is scheduled to launch sometime in 2025 oddly enough this side chain is based on Cosmos and this makes xrp's upcoming evm side chain analogous to the likes of SE and evos viter seems to have confirmed in a presentation earlier this year that zamon will support xrp's evm side chain as he said that it will have cross-chain functionality meanwhile David has done many presentations about quote institutional grade defi on xrp which gives the impression that xrp's upcoming developments are on The xrp Ledger and institutionally focused when the opposite is in fact the case new slash but it seems that most of xrp's upcoming developments will be on its evm side chain and Retail orientated with zon as the de facto front end for this ecosystem and this is more significant than you think because zon will effectively abstract away the fact that xrp users are using an evm side chain and this B the question of where Ripple Labs fits into xrp's new retail use cases the answer is where things get fascinating again you see xrp's original design made it a direct competitor to stable coins consider that both make it possible to transfer value instantly around the world namely currencies as I'm sure you will all have heard Ripple revealed its own stable coin dubbed RL USD earlier this year however I bet only a few of you you have noticed the changes that Ripple has made to its website as you can see Ripple now offers three solutions payments digital asset custody and its stable coin which will likely also play a role in the payments offering as I mentioned earlier this possibility is a big part of why some in the xrp community are nervous if Ripple has RL USD why does it need xrp although Ripple Executives have insisted that RL USD will be nothing but beneficial for xrp this isn't as clear-cut as they've made it sound besides the fact that RL USD could eat into xrp's existing market share for crossborder payments it's possible that most of RL usd's Supply won't even be on The xrp Ledger this is because Ripple is also launching RL USD on ethereum where most of crypto's liquidity currently is now for what it's worth it's likely that lots of RL usd's Supply will be on xrp's evm side chain which will leverage a form of xrp for fees more importantly xrp could become very robust defi collateral this brings me to xrp's current and future price action xop has practically gone vertical since Trump won the US election in November now for reference Trump has made lots of pro crypto comments and it's assumed that this will translate to proc crypto policy if you look closely you'll notice that xrp really started ripping after it was reported that Ripple's CEO Brad garlinghouse was rumored to have met with Trump personally similarly the most recent ripping rally was initially triggered by the news that SEC chairman Gary Gensler would be stepping down on that note if you've been keeping up with our updates about the sec's case against Ripple you'll know that Ripple settled with the SEC over the summer what you may not know though is that the SEC recently appealed that ruling the good news is that this is unlikely to change the fact that xrp itself is not a security and secondary sales of xrp are not Securities the bad news is that the sec's refusal to back down could create bad news for xrp from time to time and this assumes the appeal won't be abandoned when a new SEC chair is appointed after Gary steps down in January which is actually very likely in any case at the time of shooting xrp is close to $3 which is a key psychological level it's possible that the imminent launch of Ripple's RL USD stable coin will be the Catalyst that takes it above $3 and to new all-time highs conversely it could Mark a local top for xrp the keyword local top how high xrp could go in this cycle is hard to know given all the factors involved but one thing is certain xrp's market cap will not be flipping ethereums or Bitcoin not sure who needs to hear it but price tag isn't what determines a crypto's potential it's the market cap the larger the market cap the harder it is to pump a crypto's price in percentage terms well xrp has an enormous market cap that said it's possible keyword possible that xrp could be following e one cycle behind if this is the case then xrp could hit a market market cap of around 540 billion at the cycle top which could occur sometime in 2025 and this would translate to an xrp top of around $7 this is amazing for everyone who's been dcing into xrp over the last few years but not so amazing for those who've bought it anytime over the past few weeks that's because it only translates to a 3X or so from xrp's current price there are lots of other cryptos out there with more potential at this stage if you're wondering which ones the answer is the altcoins in xrp's ecosystem which are obscenely undervalued relative to xrp if even a fraction of capital is rotated out of xrp into these altcoins many of them could see gains of 100x or more and this is inevitable when xrp's full def5 functionality comes online as I hinted a few moments ago the new xrp utility that everyone seems to be for for getting about is its use as collateral in the upcoming D5 protocols the fact that xrp has such a massive market cap and a relatively stable price makes it a robust asset to borrow against in defi just like BTC and eth all that's missing is the lending and borrowing protocols to make it happen for xrp lo and behold David and Ripple's developers have been laser focused on launching a lending and borrowing protocol for xrp when that happens tens of billions of dollars of liquidity could be unlocked and flood into xrp's ecosystem speaking of which most of this liquidity could come in the form of RL USD which will likely be possible to borrow using xrp as collateral in its upcoming defi protocols and this is especially likely given that Ripple's motivation for launching RL USD was not payments per se but defi per David's own admission now all we need to do is figure out which altcoins in xrp's ecosystem will pump the most as it so happens this is exactly the kind of stuff we do at the coin Bureau club we do weekly reviews of small cap altcoins voted on by our members to find those next 100x gems in ecosystems like xrp and others to put things into perspective xrp has rallied almost 1,000 times over the last decade and it's likely that there are other 1,000 XG GS waiting in its ecosystem so if you don't want to miss out on the next xrp then become a member of the coin Bureau Club using the link in the description before it's too late now whether xrp could pull a 3X or more ultimately depends on its upcoming Milestones xrp has no road map but lots of Milestones now some of these Milestones have been mentioned already such as the launch of the xrp evm side chain and the introduction of borrowing and lending protocols for xrp another upcoming Milestone is smart contract functionality on The xrp Ledger itself something that's currently expected to be done using a technology called hooks it seems there's not much point in explaining it as David mentioned in an October presentation that they're looking for suggestions on different ways of implementing smart contracts on xrp this therefore implies that hooks won't be the solution that reminds me The xrp Ledger Foundation recently reincorporated itself in France and this suggests that the foundation will play a more active role in xrp's development and this makes sense when you remember that xrp is looking to accelerate development to introduce new retail focused use cases it goes without saying that Ripple will play a key role here while it has yet to announce anything concrete it's safe to say that Ripple will be looking to Leverage The RL USD stable coin for payments and this is evident in comments made by Ripple's Executives and blog posts made by Ripple Labs that also reminds me in a recent panel discussion Brad seems to have implied that Ripple could be looking to get a banking license a ripple also published a blog post last year about proof of stake which could foreshadow a transition to proof of stake for xrp note that both things will be possible in 2025 thanks to a better regulatory backdrop all we wondering is whether Ripple will conduct an IPO I. E listed stock on exchanges to bring you up to speed Brad noted in 2022 that Ripple would look to do an IPO after its case with the SEC was settled last year Ripple filed a job posting that reportedly made it look like it was preparing to list on a stock exchange earlier this year however Ripple bought back some of its stock to quote give its early investors an exit route implying that it wouldn't be doing so by going public given the circumstances it's hard to say whether ripples going public would help or hurt xrp and the same goes for its stable coin initiatives and this of course brings me to the challenges that xrp faces and the first challenge is that xrp's price is still heavily influenced by Ripple this happens indirectly via what Ripple does or doesn't do with products that leverage xrp and it also happens directly via the fact that Ripple gets lots of its funding from selling xrp historical data from coin market cap reveals that xrp's circulating supply has increased by around 4 billion over the last year or so when you recall that Ripple's Executives have already sold most of their xrp Holdings and that xrp has no inflation this means all this new Supply came from Ripple selling assuming an average price of xrp of roughly 50 cents over over this period which is actually a conservative estimate Ripple has sold no less than $2 billion worth of xrp over the last year to Ripple's credit though they've made the selling very transparent publishing quarterly reports revealing how much xrp they've sold before you freak out Ripple can't dump its xrp whenever it wants because it's subject to Escrow in plain English 1 billion xrp is unlocked to Ripple every month the xrp Ripple doesn't sell from that pile gets added at the end of the escrow I.
