The bears are out for Ripple (XRP), and there are no signs that this price action is going to change course anytime soon.
For much of the day, Ripple (XRP) was trading within a 1 cent range. This ambivalent sideways movement rarely promotes optimism among Ripple traders, and today was no exception. After topping out at just over $0.31, Ripple sank to 24 hour lows of $0.29 and is still falling at the time of this writing. At its height, Ripple was +3.0%, but is now -4.45%, with further lows expected.
If Ripple (XRP) goes on to break the $0.29 support line, we could be flirting with a total erasure of the gains experienced during the 2017 bull run. An extreme bear case would put us in the realm of $0.20 per XRP, though Ripple will likely stabilize before this, with several upcoming support levels before we hit this level.
The Sentiment Behind the Price Action
Sentiment remains the most significant indicator of a cryptocurrency’s price behavior. Despite improvements to Ripple’s technology, and increased adoption, the market remains suspicious of the cryptocurrency’s long term prospects in the real world.
While Ripple investors can be tempted to view Ripple in isolation, it’s important to remember that most cryptocurrencies are plummeting in value at this time. During the 2017 bull run, many predicted that “the bubble would pop”. Now that we’re unquestionably living in the post-pop era, the question is: which cryptocurrency projects will survive?
The market is flooded with hundreds of active blockchain projects. Many of these are redundant, and it’s impossible that all will survive. One major factor in a blockchain’s survival is its ongoing funding. More than a few cryptocurrency projects are funded by their own coins. Development teams sell their own coins for fiat (or other) currency in order to make for further development. But what happens when a coin’s value declines to the point where this is no longer feasible?
Ripple Won’t Be Sunk By Declining Prices
In the short term, Ripple is likely to lose value like most of the other cryptocurrencies in the market. However, Ripple’s financing future is bright. With a widespread base of investors and users, and institutional market penetration and partnership, it will take a great deal more than an extended fall in price to sink Ripple.
Today’s technical analysis numbers will be all the more punishing for smaller projects which don’t have the firm foundation of Ripple. Even if prices regress to pre-bull-run levels (as our models indicate they very well might), Ripple has a warchest that will help them survive.
Expect the crypto market to begin to eliminate redundancy. Investors are likely to move their resources into sector leaders if prices continue to decline. If 2017 bull run prices are entirely erased (or if prices fall still lower), we’ll do our best to see the new bottom.
If you’re a Ripple investor, today’s news might not be good, and no TA method can promise a better future. But as all crypto projects are suffering from similar forces, we can hope that the strong (like Ripple) will survive.
*Information in this article should not be taken as investment advice.