XRP Price Forecast - XRP-USD Holds the $2 Line as Clarity Act Vote and Powell Drama Put Crypto on Edge

XRP-USD Near-Term Range And Market Context

Macro Shock, Rates Anxiety And Why XRP-USD Is Trapped Around $2.00

XRP-USD is sitting in a narrow $2.03–$2.10 band while the macro backdrop does the real heavy lifting. The fight between the White House and the Fed, including Jerome Powell’s remark about a threatened criminal indictment, forced global investors to reprice institutional risk and pushed capital into classic havens. Gold has ripped above $4,600, silver rallied sharply, and the euro and Swiss franc strengthened as the dollar’s “untouchable” status took a hit. Equities mostly absorbed the shock: Indian indices broke a five-day losing streak with the Nifty 50 up ~0.42% and the Sensex up ~0.36%. In that environment, XRP-USD near $2.05 is not trading on project stories; it’s trading as a high-beta macro asset that reacts to shifts in rates and risk appetite. The next big macro triggers are U.S. December CPI on January 14–15 and the Fed meeting on January 27–28, which will decide whether this $2 zone holds or gives way.

Tight Tape For XRP-USD: $2.03–$2.11 Compression And Order Flow

The short-term tape is brutally simple. On the downside, buyers show up repeatedly around $2.03–$2.04, refusing to let XRP-USD close decisively below $2.00. On the upside, every push into $2.08–$2.11 gets sold. One intraday flush of roughly 110.6 million XRP changed hands near $2.08, about 87% above the 24-hour average volume, and instead of driving a breakout it produced a rejection. That tells you there is real supply layered above $2.08, with larger players using strength to offload rather than chase momentum. Price action is classic volatility compression: lower highs into flat support around $2.04, no capitulation below $2.00, and no acceptance above $2.11. Until one side finally absorbs the other at the edge of this band, XRP-USD will keep rotating between $2.04 and $2.08 and punishing impatient traders.

Four-Hour Structure: XRP-USD Digests A Late-2025 Rally Above $2.00 And Below $2.40

On the four-hour chart, XRP-USD is not crashing; it is cooling after a powerful run. Following a late-2025 rally, price topped near $2.40 on major spot venues and then rolled over toward the $2.04 area. The structure on intermediate timeframes is still higher highs and higher lows, but with volatility compressed and candles sitting just below short-term moving averages. Immediate resistance is stacked between $2.09–$2.11, where a key four-hour moving average and the 0.5 Fibonacci retracement cluster. A clean break and hold above that band would confirm that the recent pullback is just digestion and reopen the upper corridor toward $2.17 and then $2.28–$2.30. On the downside, support between $2.02–$2.01 aligns with the 0.382 Fibonacci level, and the market has treated $2.00 as a psychological barrier that must not fail. A loss of $2.00 on expanding volume is the signal that the consolidation has turned into a deeper retracement rather than a pause.

Daily Chart For XRP-USD: Moving Averages, RSI And The $1.80–$2.40 Corridor

The daily picture shows where this battle sits in the broader move. XRP-USD recently hit a major resistance zone around $2.40, just under a long-term moving average that has acted as a trend filter. Price was rejected there, then slipped back under a shorter daily moving average near $2.20, and is now leaning on the $2.00 mid-range from the prior swing. Momentum confirms the loss of urgency: the daily RSI has rolled over from overbought and is threatening to slide below 50, transforming an impulsive advance into a range. A daily close below $2.00 exposes the previous significant low near $1.80. Conversely, if XRP-USD can reclaim $2.20, close back above $2.40, and hold that zone, the door reopens for a run toward the $3.00 region in the coming months. For now, the working corridor on the daily chart is $1.80–$2.40, with $2.00 exactly in the middle of that battlefield.

XRP Versus Bitcoin: 2,100–2,800 Sats Range And Relative Performance Pressure

Measured against Bitcoin, XRP is stuck in its own fight. The XRP/BTC pair ripped from around 2,100 sats to just under 2,600 sats, breaking briefly above both the 100-day and 200-day moving averages before stalling. The cross is now back near 2,250 sats, sitting just below the long-term average at roughly 2,400 sats while the shorter moving average tries to provide a floor. If 2,200–2,250 sats holds, bulls still have a chance to build a higher low and attempt another push toward 2,700–2,800 sats. If that zone fails, the pair likely drifts back toward the 2,000 sats demand area and XRP underperforms BTC again. From a portfolio perspective, this matters: even if XRP-USD holds $2.00, losing relative strength against Bitcoin makes it harder to attract incremental capital from multi-asset crypto funds.

Derivatives, Spot Flows And Open Interest Around $4 Billion In XRP Markets

Derivatives and spot data fit the consolidation story. During the late-2025 rally, XRP futures open interest expanded sharply and climbed toward the $4.0 billion region, confirming that leverage was piling in on the upside. As soon as price stalled under $2.40, open interest started to cool while XRP-USD shifted into a sideways band. That is typical partial deleveraging: speculative excess is being bled off without a full liquidation cascade. At the same time, spot netflows have been skewed negative, with roughly $28 million of net outflows in recent sessions as sellers dominate exchange flows on downswings. Short bursts of inflows appear but lack follow-through. The result is a market that still holds elevated positioning compared with historical norms but is no longer in a squeeze; it is in a standoff. If a break of $2.11 happens while open interest rises again, the move has fuel. If a drop below $2.00 coincides with renewed OI expansion, that signals traders are pressing the short side rather than closing longs.

DeFi, Cross-Chain Narratives And Their Impact On XRP-USD Liquidity

Beyond the pure chart, the narrative layer around XRP is shifting. Cardano’s founder has laid out a roadmap where Cardano’s Midnight protocol becomes a privacy-enabled hub for Bitcoin DeFi and XRP DeFi, with assets from BTC and XRP ecosystems routed through privacy-preserving smart contracts. Support through wallets like Lace and cross-chain bridges would allow XRP holders to interact with broader DeFi rails without leaving their asset base. In parallel, there is mounting activity around tokenized real-world assets on the XRP Ledger, including plans for tokenized gold and other yield-bearing instruments. Taken together, this expands the use case of XRP from simple cross-border liquidity token toward a settlement asset embedded in multi-chain DeFi flows. That does not move the price tick-by-tick, but it supports the case that structural demand for XRP liquidity can grow once the macro cycle and regulatory fog clear.

Regulatory Catalyst: Clarity Act Vote On January 15 And The $2.00 Pivot

Short-term, one date stands out: January 15, 2026, when U.S. lawmakers vote on the Digital Asset Market Structure and Clarity Act. XRP-USD is currently oscillating between $2.03 and $2.10, almost perfectly positioned as a “wait-and-see” asset into that vote. The proposed framework would spell out which agencies oversee which segments, curb wash trading, and tighten reserve transparency for platforms. Reduced legal uncertainty and clearer rules are exactly what large institutions want before adding size. If the Act passes with crypto-friendly language, XRP-USD above $2.00 has a straightforward route to test $2.18, then $2.32, and potentially $2.50 as capital steps in. A messy vote, delays, or hostile amendments that leave key questions unresolved would do the opposite: the $2.00 floor becomes vulnerable, with $1.90 and $1.80 back on the radar. This is why price has stayed range-bound between $2.00 and $2.18 in recent projections; the market is explicitly pricing a binary regulatory catalyst.

Post-Lawsuit Landscape: From SEC Fine To ETF Hopes And Long-Term Paths For XRP-USD

Structurally, the end of the SEC fight changed the risk profile of XRP-USD. After nearly five years of litigation, the case formally wrapped in August 2025 when both sides dropped their appeals. The earlier court ruling had already established that XRP sales on public exchanges were not securities, while some institutional placements did violate securities law. The final settlement landed at about $50 million, far below the SEC’s original $125 million ask, and removed the biggest legal overhang on the token. That clearance is why banks and payment firms can now look at XRP without assuming they are walking into immediate enforcement. On top of that, there is growing talk about a future XRP ETF, especially after spot Bitcoin ETFs drove roughly a 90% move in BTC in their first major cycle. Long-horizon projections based on this cleaner regime are aggressive: some institutional research desks see $8 as attainable by 2026, panel estimates cluster around $2.80 for late 2025 and $5+ into 2030, and the most optimistic retail models stretch toward $35–$40 by 2035. Hyperbolic $100–$1,000 targets imply market capitalizations between tens of trillions and over $57 trillion, larger than most of the global equity market, and should be treated as fantasy rather than base case. The realistic takeaway is simpler: regulatory clarity removed the ceiling on adoption, but XRP-USD still has to earn every dollar of upside through usage and flows.

Upside Roadmap For XRP-USD: $2.11, $2.17, $2.28–$2.30, $2.32 And $2.50

If XRP-USD can defend $2.00–$2.02 and buyers finally absorb the offers around $2.08–$2.11, the upside ladder is well defined. The first checkpoint is a sustained hold above $2.11, which would confirm that the recent compression has resolved upward and that the four-hour resistance band is now support. From there, $2.17 is the next logical magnet, marking a prior reaction high and the top of the immediate intraday range. Above $2.17, the $2.28–$2.30 area is the next supply pocket, where previous advances stalled and late longs from the last rally remain trapped. Breaking that band would align with the more constructive scenarios from recent research notes, where $2.32 becomes the next extension level and $2.50 turns into the key medium-term target. A decisive move into $2.28–$2.50 with expanding volume, rising open interest, and improving XRP/BTC ratio would confirm that the market has moved out of digestion and back into trend, validating more ambitious medium-term paths like $3+ if macro conditions cooperate.

Downside Map For XRP-USD: $2.02, $2.00, $1.92–$1.93 And $1.80

The downside ladder is equally clear and cannot be ignored. The first defense is $2.02–$2.01, which has already acted as intraday support and aligns with short-term Fibonacci structure. Losing that shelf puts $2.00 in play again, and this time the market may not be as patient. A clean break below $2.00 with volume meaningfully above recent averages would send a strong signal that buyers have stepped aside. In that case, the immediate targets are $1.92–$1.93, where price previously found demand, and then the broader support near $1.80 highlighted by daily analyses. A move to $1.80 would still sit above the late-2025 base and would not break the entire longer-term uptrend, but it would represent roughly a 13% drawdown from $2.07 and would reset positioning. For traders, that zone marks the lower boundary of the current cycle’s acceptable pain; below $1.80, the narrative shifts from “healthy retracement” to “failed breakout” and more aggressive de-risking would be expected.

Structural Headwinds For XRP-USD: Stablecoins, CBDCs, SWIFT Upgrades And Volatility

Even with the lawsuit behind it, XRP-USD is not operating in a vacuum. The biggest competitive threat comes from stablecoins and prospective central bank digital currencies. Banks and payment companies can route cross-border flows through dollar-linked stablecoins or future CBDCs that eliminate FX volatility, something XRP-USD cannot offer by design. Ripple’s own RLUSD stablecoin is already above $1 billion in market capitalization, and there is a real risk that large institutions prefer that stable instrument over XRP for pure payment rails. At the same time, the legacy SWIFT network is upgrading, reducing settlement times and clawing back some of the edge that XRP once had as a fast alternative. Volatility remains another constraint: after the lawsuit win, XRP-USD spiked to roughly $3.66 in July 2025 and then dropped about 44% to around $2.03, underlining how quickly gains can evaporate. Those dynamics cap how much balance-sheet capital conservative institutions are willing to park in XRP-USD, even with clear regulation.

XRP-USD Investment View: Speculative Buy Above $2.00 With A Clear Line At $1.90

Putting all of this together, XRP-USD around $2.05 sits at a clean technical and fundamental inflection point. The token has regulatory clarity after a $50 million settlement, a growing DeFi and tokenization story, a realistic medium-term institutional path toward the $3–$8 band if adoption and macro conditions line up, and a very visible short-term catalyst in the January 15 Clarity Act vote. Technically, the structure is compression rather than collapse: repeated defenses of $2.03–$2.04, clear resistance at $2.08–$2.11, upside waypoints at $2.17, $2.28–$2.30, $2.32 and $2.50, and a downside staircase through $2.02, $2.00, $1.92–$1.93, and $1.80. Given that profile, the stance here is bullish but selective. For active traders, XRP-USD is a speculative Buy above $2.00 with a hard invalidation in the $1.90–$1.92 zone: as long as that band holds, the risk/reward favors a break of $2.11 and a test of $2.17–$2.30 into and after the regulatory and macro catalysts. A daily close below $1.90 would flip the bias back to neutral and signal that the market has chosen the downside path out of this range rather than the upside.

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