Against the backdrop of continuous positive news over the past few weeks, Ripple's XRP token has continued to rise, increasing by 376% since the US election voting day (November 6 Taiwan time), reaching $2.45, returning to price levels not seen since January 2018, when it briefly touched historical highs of around $3.40. The surge in coin price also pushed its market capitalization past the $100 billion mark, reaching $140 billion before the deadline.
The recent wave of XRP's surge is related to reports released over the weekend. Fox Business cited insiders last Friday stating that the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) has indicated it will approve the issuance of the RLUSD stablecoin by Ripple. If approved, Ripple will be allowed to legally issue RLUSD tokens to the public, potentially launching as early as December 4.
The rise of XRP began in early November when the Republican Party won the US elections, rekindling investor confidence in tokens associated with US companies, especially in terms of regulatory easing and legislative pushes that could benefit companies facing regulatory lawsuits, including Ripple Labs. Some traders also anticipate that the US will launch an XRP exchange-traded fund (ETF).
XRP and the open interest (OI) of contracts priced in US dollars have also set new records. According to data from CoinGlass, the open interest for XRP contracts on exchanges reached $4.18 billion.
In addition to the potential upcoming launch of the RLUSD stablecoin, Ripple stated in September this year that it would introduce native smart contract functionality on the XRP Ledger (XRPL) and launch the XRPL EVM sidechain by 2025, bringing new programmability to the XRPL developer ecosystem.
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