On June 17, on-chain monitoring firm Whale Alert revealed in a recent X post a mysterious crypto transfer worth nearly half a billion dollars, involving the renowned enterprise blockchain company Ripple and the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, XRP.
According to the data tracker, Ripple sent a massive 200 million XRP tokens worth over $438 million to an unknown wallet, sparking curiosities among XRP holders.
The move, which appears to be a longstanding routine from Ripple, comes as no surprise, as Ripple has been consistent with moving large amounts of XRP tokens to unidentified wallets month after month. However, XRP holders are concerned about the motive behind the move, considering its timing.
Notably, the massive transfer marks another major XRP move made by Ripple since June, as the company appears to be redistributing its XRP holdings. Earlier this month, Ripple unlocked a billion XRP tokens from escrow after it had locked 670 million tokens in its escrow wallets about three days earlier.
While the motive behind the recent XRP transfer from Ripple remains uncertain, XRP holders are worried that it might be a bearish move, considering that it happened after XRP saw its price fall sharply from a high of $2.25 to an unexpected low of $2.15 on the same day.
Also, Ripple’s prolonged legal case with the SEC, which has recently been put on hold, has made the move more concerning, as XRP investors are carefully observing actions from the company to help them hedge against potential shortcomings.
The massive XRP transfer from Ripple to an unidentified destination comes at a time when XRP is seeing massive sell-offs from holders amid a broad crypto market bloodbath.
Data from CoinMarketCap shows that the token has dropped massively by 6.26% over the last day, with its price trading negatively at $2.16 at press time.
The growing uncertainties across the market have sparked more curiosity among market watchers about whether the move could help XRP flip to the other side of the market or if it is just one of those bearish moves that could fuel further drops for the token.
