Ripple unlocks 1.5 million tokens; XRP/USD not affected

• XRP/USD settles above $0.2300, however, the further recovery is limited.
• 1.5 million XRP tokens were released from Ripple’s escrow wallet.

Ripple’s XRP has settled above $0.2300 as the cryptocurrency market attempted recovery from the recent sell-off. The third-largest coin has gained over 1.6% since the beginning of Sunday; however, the upside momentum remains weak as the price stays below key technical levels.

The initial resistance is created by $0.2364, which is the highest level of the day. It is followed by psychological $0.2400. A sustainable move above this level to mitigate the pressure and take the price towards the next barrier created by SMA200 daily at $0.2520 and SMA50 daily at $0.2560. The next important resistance comes at $0.2750 (the broken neckline of a head-and-shoulder formation).

On the downside, once $0.2300 is broken, the sell-off may be extended towards the recent low of $0.2245 followed by psychological $0.2200 and $0.2138, which is the lower line of the Bollinger Band on a daily chart.

XRP/USD daily chart

1.5 million XRP transferred from Ripple’s escrow account

As reported by a Whale alert service, 1.5 million XRP tokens worth $115 million have been released from Ripple Escrow Wallet on the first day of March. The transaction is in line with scheduled token sales carried out by Ripple under on the first day of each month. The company uses the proceeds to finance the development and distribute it between the network partners. The transaction did not produce a notable effect on the market. If history is any guide, these injections have minimal correlation with price movements, though they inevitably trigger lots of critical comments.

The CEO of Ripple earlier explained that the company is not interested in devaluing XRP, that was why it was not going to dump a significant amount of XRP to the market. He said:

XRP sales are about helping expand XRP’s utility – building RippleNet & supporting other biz building w/XRP ie Dharma & Forte. Reality is we decreased our sales by volume Q/Q and since then the inflation rate of XRP circulating supply has been lower than that of BTC and ETH.