Wallets holding oversized XRP positions are plunging quickly in the wake of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission’s lawsuit against Ripple. Industry data reveals just how quickly these so-called XRP whales are sinking. Coin Metrics, a leading data provider on all things cryptocurrency and blockchain, estimated that the number of wallet addresses holding at least 1 million XRP has dropped to 1,567 from 1,721 between Dec. 21, 2020 and Jan. 3. In other words, it appears that XRP whales are liquidating a portion of their holdings amid regulatory uncertainty surrounding Ripple. As the following chart from Coin Metrics illustrates, …

Grayscale Investments, the world’s largest cryptocurrency asset manager, announced Tuesday that it has liquidated its XRP holdings and used the remaining funds to buy up more Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC). The decision affects Grayscale’s Digital Large Cap Fund, a market-cap-weighted asset that provides exposure to the largest cryptocurrencies by market capitalization. The sale of XRP occurred on Monday, less than a week after Genesis Global Trading, the fund’s authorized participant, announced it would soon temporarily suspend XRP trading, likely in relation to the lawsuit filed by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission against Ripple. Genesis …

Litecoin (LTC) and XRP briefly traded places in market capitalization rankings over the weekend, highlighting the impact of the recent lawsuit against Ripple filed by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. The so-called “flippening” happened early Sunday when Litecoin’s market cap hit $9.95 billion following a more than 12% surge in price. XRP, meanwhile, had declined in excess of 25% over a 24-hour trading period. LITECOIN JUST FLIPPED XRP pic.twitter.com/yjBq15JtpV — HODLGeorge (@BitfuryGeorge) January 3, 2021 At press time, XRP was back in the fourth position with a market cap of $10.5 billion. Litecoin, meanwhile, was worth just over …

Cryptocurrency payments processor and exchange operator Uphold has formally clarified that it will not delist XRP for the time being. As part of an announcement made on Monday, Uphold stated it will not be removing XRP from its crypto offerings until the lawsuit filed by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission is resolved. “Uphold has decided to continue listing XRP until and unless the SEC's Complaint is adjudicated in the SEC's favour and XRP is judged to be a security today (or trading volume dissipates to a point where we can no longer support XRP).” The exchange noted that …

Several investors in XRP have filed with a Rhode Island court, looking to change the course of the Securities and Exchange Commission's case against Ripple. In response to what it calls "the most significant SEC enforcement action in modern history," the Friday filing is a petition for a "writ of mandamous." A "mandamus" is effectively just an order that a public official — in this case, the chairman of the SEC — does their job. The filers are calling upon new Acting Chairman Elad Roisman to alter the course that his predecessor, Jay Clayton, set by beginning enforcement against Ripple …

As token prices plunge and Ripple prepares for court, a band of XRP enthusiasts have rallied around a petition that may force a White House statement on the recent SEC lawsuit alleging Ripple conducted an unregistered securities offering. A petition filed on the White House-run We the People website titled “We the People ask the federal government to deem XRP, the virtual currency, a currency,” has now crossed 10,000 signatures. Created by the Obama administration in 2011, We the People allows users to create petitions that, upon reaching 100,000 signatures within 30 days, will prompt an official White House response. …

Paolo Ardoino, the outspoken chief technology officer of Bitfinex, took to Twitter this week to dispel concerns that Tether could be the next target of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. In response to a tweet from CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju, Ardoino said Tether adheres to strict Know Yor Customer/Anti-Money Laundering regulations set forth by the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN. In other words, people who say Tether is less regulated are just spreading “FUD”— or fear, uncertainty and doubt. Ju’s original tweet said: “If SEC's next target is Tether, it's going to be very, …

Binance.US, the American branch of the global crypto exchange, and crypto-friendly asset trading service eToro are the latest platforms to suspend XRP trading in the United States. Announcing the news on Thursday, eToro revealed that U.S. customers will not be able to trade XRP starting Jan. 3, 2021. Customers with existing trades at the time will have three weeks from that date to close all open positions, the platform added in its statement. For Binance.US, the effective date of its XRP delisting is Jan. 13, 2021. However, the delisting will not affect the claim process for Flare's Spark (FLR) token …

The COVID-19 pandemic dominated the news in 2020, affecting myriad sectors — health, economics, social justice, politics and trade, as well as the cryptocurrency and blockchain industry. As country after country locked down to halt the virus’s spread, governments seized upon stimulus payments to preserve economic life. While necessary, these measures raised the specter of global inflation. This, in turn, pushed many traditional investors and institutions to take a new look at cryptocurrencies as an alternate store of value, especially Bitcoin (BTC), the top crypto. Following a March 11 dip, BTC went on a tear, reaching record levels by year …

The XRP token’s market capitalization has fallen almost $130 billion since its all-time high in 2018, making the cryptocurrency project’s decline comparable to the collapse of major financial institutions. According to Josh Frank of crypto-focused research company The TIE, the project is experiencing a collapse similar to some of the biggest corporate scandals and catastrophes in recent history. XRP's market cap has fallen by 93% from $137B to under $10B. That makes the value of the XRP collapse bigger than Enron and Worldcom. While not a bankruptcy, XRP is effectively the third largest collapse of all time behind Lehman Brothers …

Update 12.31.2020 at 15:49 ET. Grayscale has clarified to Cointelegraph that despite the data set published by Bybt on Dec. 30, the fund has not liquidated positions in XRP or XLM. Grayscale's commentary is available here. Grayscale Investments, the world’s largest digital asset manager, has reportedly dumped a significant portion of its XRP and XLM holdings. Data from Bybt, a cryptocurrency futures trading platform, reveals that Grayscale’s XRP holdings declined by more than 9.18 million on Dec. 29, bringing its total position to 26.45 million XRP, worth $5.77 million at press time. On the same day, Grayscale reportedly liquidated over …

The United States District Court of the Southern District of New York has fixed Feb. 22, 2021 as the date for the pretrial of the lawsuit filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission against Ripple Labs and its principal actors. According to a court document filed on Tuesday, counsel representing all parties on the matter will hold a telephone pretrial conference. As part of preparations for the preliminary hearing, the parties in the case will submit a joint letter a week before the pretrial date addressing: “(1) a brief description of the case, including the factual and legal basis for …