TL;DR
Ripple will unlock one billion XRP in August, which could impact the price due to increased supply.Analysts predict a bullish trend for XRP, expecting a significant breakout.The Upcoming Unlocks
Ripple is set to unlock one billion XRP at the start of August – a practice that happens every month and is part of the company’s strategy to ensure a transparent release of its holdings. The initiative dates back to 2017, when Ripple placed 55 billion XRP tokens into a series of escrows.
“The escrow consists of independent on-ledger escrows that release a total of one billion XRP each month over the next 55 months. This provides an upper limit on the amount of new XRP that can be brought into circulation.
The amount of XRP actually released into circulation will likely be much less than this. Any additional XRP leftover each month will be placed into a new escrow to release in the first month, which no escrow currently releases,” the team explained at the time.
The current USD equivalent of the upcoming unlock is over $600 million and will increase the circulating supply of XRP.
It is worth noting, though, that the structured and predictable nature of the event may stabilize investor sentiment as market participants are aware of the scheduled initiative and can prepare for it accordingly. XRP’s price remained relatively flat after last month’s token unlock.
Ripple is not the only crypto project to release a substantial amount of coins in the following days. Wormhole plans to unlock 600 million tokens (worth over $170 million) on August 3, while Optimism will increase the circulating supply with 16.54 tokens (equaling almost $30 million) on July 31.
XRP Price Predictions
Crypto X is rammed with bullish analysts who anticipate a massive XRP price resurgence in the short term. Mikybull Crypto recently argued that the asset has formed “a bull pennant continuation pattern” on the daily chart.
“The breakout will be massive. The pattern rarely fails,” they added.
A bull pennant continuation pattern usually occurs after a strong price movement and is characterized by a consolidation phase with converging trendlines. Recall that XRP’s price soared from less than $0.40 at the start of July to over $0.63 two weeks later. In the following days, it passed through enhanced volatility before consolidating around the current mark of $0.60.
Crypto Tony also chipped in, maintaining that XRP remains in the $0.56-$0.65 support zone. The trader promised to hop on the bandwagon as soon as the price crossed the upper level.