The founders of Ripple, a fintech company specializing in blockchain-based money transfers, launched XRP (XRP +0.69%) in 2012. They minted XRP's entire supply of 100 billion tokens on the XRP Ledger before its market debut, and it started trading at $0.0058 in 2013.
By early 2018, XRP's price had reached a record high of $3.84 per token. But as of this writing, it only trades at about $1.43. Therefore, a $10,000 investment in XRP's earliest trade would have briefly grown to $6.62 million before shrinking back to about $2.41 million today. Let's see why XRP's token has been so volatile -- and where it might head over the next ten years.
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Why was XRP so volatile?
XRP was mainly used as a bridge currency for cross-border fiat currency transfers on Ripple. By converting both fiat currencies into XRP on the blockchain, Ripple facilitated faster, cheaper, and more secure cross-border money transfers than conventional SWIFT interbank transfers.
Ripple's founders also sold the company's own XRP holdings to fund its own expansion. That unusual strategy sparked a lawsuit from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which accused Ripple of selling its XRP tokens as unlicensed securities in 2020. Those allegations cost Ripple some of its top customers and caused the top crypto exchanges to delist XRP.
CRYPTO: XRP
Key Data Points
XRP's price remained under pressure until 2025, when the lawsuit finally concluded with a lighter-than-expected fine against Ripple. The judge also ruled that the token wasn't an unlicensed security when sold to retail investors on the open market.
Ripple gained more customers again, the top crypto exchanges relisted XRP, and the SEC approved XRP's first spot price ETFs in late 2025. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) even conditionally approved Ripple's application for a U.S. banking license this January.
But where will XRP head over the next 10 years?
Those positive developments ended a multi-year slump for XRP and propelled its price from below $1 per token to a multi-year high of $3.65 in July 2025. However, it pulled back again over the following year because it arguably ran out of near-term catalysts.
It couldn't be valued by its scarcity like Bitcoin (BTC +0.17%), and it couldn't natively support smart contracts -- which are used to develop decentralized apps -- like Ethereum (ETH 0.61%). It also faced competition from stablecoins, which were pegged to the U.S. dollar and could serve as a more stable bridge currency for cross-border fiat currency transfers.
Over the next decade, XRP's price will either stagnate or sink unless it secures a major partnership with a top-tier bank or payment services provider. However, its volatility could drive away those potential partners -- so it could continue to underperform other top cryptocurrencies.
