Ripple price tumbled Friday as Bitcoin prices led the crypto markets into selloff mode. The XRPUSD pair has fallen 4.67% on the day as at the time of writing. Suspicions of possible whale action were fuelled when Ripple co-founder and former CTO Jed McCaleb received another consignment of Ripple to take his total holdings to more than 4.7billion XRP. Reports monitored from Whale Alert also indicate that while a court ruling constrains McCaleb from dumping all his tokens in the market, he may have been doing quite a lot of selling of late.
Such occasional whale sales are not unusual, but they usually end up depressing prices. A similar whale sale seems to be going on in the Bitcoin exchanges after Whale Alert monitored the transfer of nearly $80 million worth of Bitcoin to some of these exchanges.
Ripple price has traditionally held a positive correlation with Bitcoin prices, and it is not entirely surprising that the fall in Bitcoin prices below $7000 has also triggered a selloff on Ripple.
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As I pointed out in my analysis of the XRPUSD pair, Ripple price seemed to have stalled at the resistance zone, which was also intersected by the upper border of the rising wedge. I had expected Ripple price to make a leg down if the resistance zone remained resolute. Two days of bearish action have now taken Ripple price towards the lower barrier of the rising wedge. A breakdown of the wedge opens the door for the XRPUSD pair to target the 0.17801 price level, which is the low point of the price action of December 17, 2019 as well as recent lows of April 2-6,2020. Below this level, further bearish action could bring 0.16054 and 0.14732 into the picture.
Conversely, a bounce from the wedge’s lower border returns the price to the opposing edge, with the 0.2000 resistance being the only obstacle to this move. If the price action breaches the upper boundary and attains 0.22329 (February 26 and March 1 2020 lows), this move will invalidate the wedge pattern. Such a move has to be supported by a rise in Bitcoin prices to remain valid.