XRP has reclaimed the $2.10 level after a strong rebound across the broader crypto market, signaling renewed confidence following several days of fear, volatility, and sharp pullbacks. Analysts now see the potential for a sustained recovery as momentum returns and buyers show signs of stepping back in. The reclaim of this key level comes at a crucial moment, with traders closely watching whether XRP can build enough strength to challenge higher resistances in the coming sessions.

Adding to the renewed optimism, a new report from CryptoOnchain on CryptoQuant highlights a major spike in XRP Ledger Velocity, marking one of the strongest on-chain signals of 2025. On December 2, the Velocity metric surged to 0.0324, its highest value of the year. Velocity measures how frequently XRP moves across the network, serving as a direct indicator of economic activity, liquidity, and transactional demand.

Such a dramatic rise in Velocity shows that XRP is circulating rapidly among users rather than sitting dormant in wallets. It reflects increased participation from traders, active holders, and possibly even whales, pointing toward heightened engagement on the network.

Network Activity Surges as Velocity Signals Peak 2025 Engagement

According to the CryptoOnchain report, the latest spike in XRP Ledger Velocity indicates a dramatic shift in how XRP is being used across the network. Instead of sitting idle in cold wallets or being held for long-term storage, XRP is rapidly changing hands among market participants. This level of circulation suggests that traders, active users, and possibly whales are driving significantly higher transaction volume than usual.

CryptoOnchain explains that such a strong jump in Velocity typically signals high liquidity and deep participation across the ecosystem. When coins move this quickly, it means the asset is being used in real economic activity—whether for trading, transfers, arbitrage, or strategic repositioning by large holders. This type of behavior often aligns with periods of heightened volatility, increased speculation, or structural shifts in market sentiment.

Regardless of whether price trends upward or downward, the data confirms that the XRP Ledger is entering one of its most active phases of 2025. User engagement has reached a yearly peak, with more participants interacting with the network and more coins circulating than at any point this year.

Such elevated activity often precedes or accompanies major market movements, reinforcing the idea that XRP is transitioning into a more dynamic and liquid phase as the recovery unfolds.

XRP Faces Heavy Resistance in a Weakening Daily Structure

XRP’s daily chart shows an attempted rebound toward the $2.15–$2.20 range, but the broader structure remains pressured by a persistent downtrend. After the sharp sell-off in late October and November—which pushed XRP below the $2.00 level for the first time in months—the asset is now trying to stabilize. The recent bounce reflects short-term buying interest, yet the price still trades below all major moving averages, signaling that bulls have not fully regained control.

The 50-day SMA is currently sloping downward near $2.35, acting as immediate resistance. The 100-day SMA around $2.55 and the 200-day SMA near $2.60 form a stacked barrier above price, confirming a structurally bearish setup. For XRP to build meaningful upside momentum, it must reclaim at least the 50-day SMA and flip it into support—something it has failed to do since late September.

Support remains stable around $2.00–$2.05, where buyers have defended the level repeatedly with long lower wicks. A breakdown below this area could expose XRP to deeper losses toward $1.80. Meanwhile, volume remains muted, suggesting the rebound lacks strong conviction.

Featured image from ChatGPT, chart from TradingView.com

XRP’s derivatives market has undergone a marked regime shift, with leverage collapsing and funding normalising in a way that signals a clear retreat from aggressive speculative positioning. The strongest evidence comes from Glassnode’s latest post on November 30, which frames the current phase as a structural, not merely tactical, pause in XRP leverage.

XRP Derivatives Unwind Accelerates

“XRP’s futures OI has fallen from 1.7B XRP in early October to 0.7B XRP (~59% flush-out). Paired with the funding rate dropping from ~0.01% to 0.001% (7D-SMA), 10/10 marked a structural pause in XRP speculators’ appetite to bet aggressively on upside,” Glassnode’s CryptoVizArt wrote on X.

Open interest at 1.7 billion XRP in early October reflected a heavily leveraged market, with large notional positions stacked in futures and perpetuals. The subsequent collapse to 0.7 billion XRP implies that around one billion XRP of derivatives exposure has been closed, liquidated, or otherwise unwound. Such a reduction is not just a marginal trimming of risk; it is a wholesale deleveraging that strips out a large part of the speculative layer sitting on top of the spot market.

The funding-rate move is equally telling. A 7-day SMA around 0.01% had previously indicated a consistent long bias, with traders willing to pay a recurring fee to maintain leveraged upside exposure. The compression to roughly 0.001% pushes funding close to neutral. In perpetual futures, that transition typically occurs when demand for leveraged longs fades and the market no longer tolerates a meaningful premium to hold long positions.

Glassnode’s description of October 10 crash as the point that “marked a structural pause” captures this shift in regime: the market moved from persistent long crowding to a far more cautious, balanced stance. The November 30 post sits on top of a broader context Glassnode has been documenting through November.

In November 8, the firm highlighted how profit taking has behaved during the recent drawdown: “Unlike previous profit realization waves that aligned with rallies, since late September, as XRP fell from $3.09 (~25%) to $2.30, profit realization volume (7D-SMA) surged by ~240%, from $65M/day to $220M/day. This divergence underscores distribution into weakness, not strength.” Rather than de-risking into strength, profitable holders have been realizing gains as price fell, reinforcing the deleveraging signalled by futures data.

On November 17, Glassnode turned to supply dynamics, noting that “the share of XRP supply in profit has fallen to 58.5%, the lowest since Nov 2024, when price was $0.53. Today, despite trading ~4× higher ($2.15), 41.5% of supply (~26.5B XRP) sits in loss — a clear sign of a top-heavy and structurally fragile market dominated by late buyers.” Those on-chain figures provide the background to the 30 November derivatives snapshot: a market whose ownership is skewed toward late entrants now sits on substantial unrealized losses, while the leverage that previously amplified upside has been largely flushed.

Taken together, Glassnode’s data on futures open interest and funding rates crystallise the current state of XRP: a violent 59% leverage reset, a near-neutral funding regime, and a speculative cohort that has stepped back from paying for upside, all layered on top of a top-heavy holder base.

At press time, XRP traded at $2.04.