2025-02-10 09:39:43 by En Cryptonomist

The US banking giant JPMorgan believes that in the coming months regulators will finally agree to list spot ETFs on Ripple (XRP) on US exchanges. Between the end of 2024 and the beginning of 2025, several asset management companies such as Bitwise, 21Shares, Canary Capital, WisdomTree, and NYSE Arca have filed the appropriate 19b-4 forms with the SEC, requesting the introduction of a similar investment product on the market. If such requests were to be accepted, the price of XRP would be strongly pushed upwards, aiming for the target of 8 dollars per token. Let’s see everything in detail below. JPMorgan believes that the SEC will approve a spot ETF on XRP (Ripple) in 2025 According to JPMorgan, a multinational financial services company based in New York, the SEC is now close to approving the spot XRP ETF. Until a few weeks ago, the introduction on the American market of an exchange-traded fund for the Ripple token seemed unlikely, given the complex implications with US regulations regarding security assets. Now, however, after the arrival of the Trump administration in the government of the United States, everything seems to be destined to change. Gary Gensler, the fierce commissioner of the Securities and Exchange Commission who fought against Ripple for years, has been “ousted” by the new political pressures. In his place, Donald Trump has appointed Paul Atkins, a famous supporter of cryptocurrencies, open to a more liberal regulation for the industry. At the same time Ripple seems to be well on its way to putting the word “end” to its historic legal case against the SEC, which has been ongoing since 2020. Currently, the case is on appeal at the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, with the crypto company coming off a court victory. Several experts argue that the resolution of this dispute could have a significant impact on the approval of the spot XRP ETF, to the extent of facilitating its listing. JPMorgan even believes that a new exchange-traded fund for XRP could attract up to 8 billion dollars in net inflows from interested investors. The bank claims that a similar regulated product will have the ability to spread easily among the institutional public of Wall Street, considering the speculative potential of the cryptocurrency. At the moment, the prediction market Polymarket quotes a 45% chance that an ETF for Ripple will be approved by July 31. If we extend the time horizon until the end of 2025, the chances rise to 81%. Source: https://polymarket.com/event/ripple-etf-approved-by-july-31-2025?tid=1739176539234The impact of the ETF and the price forecasts: XRP aims for 8 dollars The forecasts by JPMorgan on the success of the spot ETF for Ripple in 2025 translate into a potential appreciation of the XRP currency. In particular, 8 billion dollars of investment flows could easily push the cryptocurrencies towards new all-time highs still unexplored. To make a comparison, Bitcoin since the launch of its related ETFs in January 2024, has attracted 40 billion dollars, increasing its market capitalization by about 1 trillion dollars. At the same pace, for Ripple a figure of 8 billion would mean increasing its capitalization by 200 billion dollars. All this translates into a forecasted growth of XRP price by 150%, reaching a value of over 6 dollars per token. Furthermore, the introduction of the ETF would significantly improve the popularity of the cryptocurrency, becoming a regulated product suitable for high-level exchanges. With the help of President Trump, XRP could potentially skyrocket as it might be selected as an asset to include in the country’s crypto reserves. For some time now, there has been talk of a national reserve of cryptocurrencies, and with the arrival of XRP ETFs, the American government could seize the opportunity and initiate this strategic move. However, the chances that XRP will be added to the national reserve remain low as of today, with a share of 17% according to Polymarket. Source: https://polymarket.com/event/us-national-xrp-reserve-in-2025?tid=1739177815828According to JPMorgan, a positive outcome would create substantial buying pressure on the crypto, even surpassing the performances recorded by Bitcoin in 2024 with the entry of the spot BTC ETF. Indicatively, if everything goes in the right direction, XRP could start to travel at a figure of around 8 dollars, with a growth of 250% from current prices. The analyst EGRAG Crypto even claims that in the long term Ripple will see a 1,000% surge in its value. The analysis of derivatives suggests that interest in XRP is decreasing While JPMorgan looks confidently at the upcoming events on the calendar for Ripple, the price chart analysis suggests a different situation for XRP. Following the increase in speculation for the entire crypto market, focused in the last quarter of 2024 and in the first weeks of 2025, now interest seems to be waning. XRP even reached the record price of 3.3 dollars just a few days ago, before ending up in a vortex with bear traction. The data from the derivative markets indicate in this regard a clear decline in trading for XRP, which no longer appears as appealing as a few weeks ago. In this regard, the open interest of futures exchanges has undergone a strong correction of 25.7% since February 6, accompanying the market dump. From January 15, however, the open interest is in a 37% collapse, reflecting a speculative picture that is not very inviting for institutional investors.  Professional traders have significantly reduced their leveraged positions as soon as XRP showed graphical weakness with an unexpected dip below 2 dollars. Source: https://www.coinglass.com/currencies/XRPAt the same time, the 8-hour funding rates on XRP futures have also dropped drastically since December 5, 2024. Currently, the rates for Ripple currency stand at 0.2% per month, in the lower range of the neutral interval and near the bear territory.  Although it is an improvement compared to the level observed on February 3, it remains significantly lower than the 0.9% recorded two weeks ago. From the point of view of derivatives, this suggests a lack of optimism among retail traders, who after the latest crash seem frightened by the speculative dynamics of the crypto markets. According to this interpretation, XRP might struggle to reach the price targets hypothesized by JPMorgan, unless there is an evident change. Source: https://www.coinglass.com/currencies/XRP