April was a big month for whales and cryptocurrencies, especially for those targeting Ripple XRP and Bitcoin (BTC).
That month, Bitcoin surged over $90k, currently trading just $3,000 below the $100k mark, according to data from CoinGecko.
It looks like the leg up came during a heavy accumulation phase that saw whales moving over $4 billion in BTC, as CryptoMode reported.
XRP was not left behind. Wallets holding between 10 million and 100 million XRP have scooped up 900 million tokens, worth just under $2 billion at current prices. That cohort now controls 7.77 billion, or roughly 13% of the circulating supply— a $17 billion position, according to data shared by popular crypto analyst Ali Martinez.
Whales bought around 900 million $XRP over the past month! pic.twitter.com/k3UyFMkJLq
— Ali (@ali_charts) May 2, 2025
XRP ETF Approval on the Horizon?
It’s no secret to anyone that another reason behind the accumulation are the rising odds of an XRP spot ETF approval in the U.S.
That’s probably the biggest catalyst here. An ETF approval is estimated by this summer, according to Bloomberg’s Eric Balchunas, pegging a 85% chance. Moreover, analysts suggest that an XRP ETF could drive over $8 billion in inflows within the first six months of trading.
The official deadline is October, but the frontrunning has already started. If the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) greenlights the product, demand could spike quickly.
Spot ETFs offer retail and institutional investors a clean, compliant on-ramp. No wallets, no custody stress, just shares. Grayscale, Franklin Templeton, 21Shares, and WisdomTree are already lining up to compete for first-mover status.
Despite XRP gaining ground on the ETF front, its footprint in the stablecoin sector seems to be weakening. The company’s RLUSD stablecoin has barely crossed a $330 million market cap. Nothing compared to any of its competitors. Oddly enough, Ripple is interested in buying Circle, the issuer of USD Coin (USDC), but Circle rejected the offer.
Related: Immutable X (IMX) Outperforms Most Cryptocurrencies Today: Analysis
