The Ripple price is in a relatively tight range as the altcoin season continues. The XRP has gained by more than 4% in the past 24 hours, bringing its total market capitalization to more than $53 billion. Its ranking has dropped from being the third-biggest cryptocurrency a few months ago to the current 7. It is still about 23% below its all-time high.
Ripple news: Ripple Labs released relatively strong quarterly results this week. The company showed that its ecosystem was still robust even as it continued to deal with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Further, it showed that whales continued to accumulate the coin hoping that its value will keep rising.
The report came on the same day that the NYT reported that the company had hired a high-powered team of lawyers and lobbyists to press its case. There have been no updates about the case this week.
Still, the biggest concern that many commentators have is about XRP. They question whether it is a decentralized currency considering how powerful Ripple Labs is. For example, in the first quarter, the company released 3 billion XRPs from its Escrow at a pace of 1 billion per month. This means that the company can manipulate the XRPs in the marketplace.
The daily chart shows that the Ripple price rose to an all-time high of $0.9242 early this year. Since then, it has retreated by more than 20%. It fell to the 61.8% Fibonacci retracement level of $0.8420 on April 24. Today, it is slightly below the 23.6% retracement level.
Also, the currency seems to have formed a symmetrical triangle pattern. With the level of confluence approaching, it means that the currency could soon have a breakout in the near term. Since this triangle has come after a major upward trend, there is a possibility that the breakout will be to the upside. However, a drop below $0.8815 will invalidate the bearish thesis.
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