In brief
- Ripple co-founder and XRP co-creator Chris Larsen has moved more of his coins to Coinbase.
- Could he be preparing to sell as XRP closes in on a new high after seven years?
- XRP is only pennies away from breaking its 2018 record mark of $3.40.
Ripple co-founder and Executive Chairman Chris Larsen has moved $26 million in XRP—the cryptocurrency he helped create—over to Coinbase, blockchain data shows.
XRP, the third-biggest cryptocurrency by market cap, was recently trading for $3.35, just 2% below its 2018 all-time high mark of $3.40, according to data from crypto data provider CoinGecko.
Over the past seven days, the asset has shot up in value by 34%, hitting its highest price since January.
Ripple’s press office didn’t respond to Decrypt‘s questions regarding the transactions, but blockchain data shows the movements to America’s biggest crypto exchange happened on Tuesday in four batches of 2 million XRP apiece—today worth over $6.5 million.
And a number of transactions happened on Thursday, where more batches of XRP totaling over $40 million were sent to unknown addresses. DL News was the first to report the movements.
In January, Larsen moved 10 million XRP—worth over $24.2 million at the time—to Coinbase. It isn’t clear whether he then sold the tokens.
One of the oldest cryptocurrencies, XRP was launched to help banks and other financial institutions move money fast and with very low fees.
Larsen made headlines last year when he donated a total of $20 million in XRP to support Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign for U.S. president and to Future Forward, a prominent Democratic PAC.
XRP has soared this week as traders put record bets on the price of the cryptocurrency going up. Notional open interest for XRP perpetual futures, which reflects the amount of money controlled by leveraged positions, soared above $8.8 billion Wednesday—a new record.
Total open interest for the asset now stands at over $10 billion, according to CoinGlass, the highest it’s ever been.
Investor interest in the digital coin has grown as the entire crypto market experiences a surge and top fund managers file applications to try and get a spot XRP ETF approved in the United States.
Myriad users predict that XRP’s next move is more likely to be a jump up to $3.50—an all-time high price—rather than a plunge to $2.00. Users give the record spike an 85% chance, as of this writing. (Disclosure: Myriad is a product of Decrypt‘s parent company, DASTAN.)
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