Over the weekend, XRP rose 45 percent to $0.6338. The rise in the crypto-asset price was likely due to the coordinated actions of cryptocurrency traders in Telegram groups.
According to CoinMarketCap, the price of XRP began rising rapidly on Saturday. The crypto-asset was trading at $0.2866 on the morning of January 30, but by mid-day the price had reached $0.5094. The growth continued on Sunday, and XRP is currently trading at $0.6338, up 45% overnight.
The price spike was likely triggered by participants in a Telegram group called Buy & Hold XRP (t.me/pumpxrp), which appeared on Saturday. Within the first 24 hours, the group surpassed 200,000 members, leading to a second group (t.me/pumpxrpofficial).
The classic "pump and dump" tactic is not new to cryptocurrencies, especially the XRP coin, which has a large number of investors. Nevertheless, their recent actions may have been inspired by the GameStop network stock situation.
Recall that last week, Reddit forum users "inflated" GameStop's stock price for institutional traders to incur losses. Cryptocurrency industry participants supported the actions of traditional traders. The WallStreetBets (WSB) token appeared on CoinMarketCap, ranking zero ahead of BTC in terms of capitalization.
As a reminder, the SEC sued Ripple and its two executives, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen, on December 22. The company is accused of selling $1.3 billion in unregistered securities, which included XRP coins.
Amid the lawsuit, many companies stopped trading in pairs with XRP. The crypto-asset had fallen significantly in December, but recent actions by traders have lifted the price above levels recorded before the SEC lawsuit. How long XRP will remain at that level is anyone's guess.