Gary Gensler announced that he would resign as chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in January, which significantly impacted XRP's price, leading to a bullish trading trend that lasted for several weeks.
As there is a general belief that the U.S. will shift towards a more crypto-friendly regulatory environment, the price of XRP surged 25% in the past 24 hours, with most of the increase concentrated in the early hours of Friday's Asian session. XRP is closely linked to Ripple Labs, which has garnered attention from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission since 2020 for allegedly selling tokens as securities to U.S. investors.
However, in 2024, Ripple completely resolved a long-standing lawsuit, bringing renewed focus to XRP, a major token with a market capitalization of $77 billion.
Related data shows that XRP has risen 65% in the past 7 days and 150% in the past month. CoinDesk market analysts expect its short-term price target to reach $1.40.
In 2024, Trump wins the election, a result that has received positive feedback from the cryptocurrency community, as he had previously expressed support for cryptocurrencies. Investors are betting that favorable policies for the crypto industry may be introduced during his administration.
Against the backdrop of a potentially more lenient regulatory environment, some traders expect that an XRP exchange-traded fund (ETF) will emerge in the U.S. This week, the trading volume of XRP on the South Korean exchange far exceeded that of Bitcoin, which usually leads the pack, reflecting strong market demand for both.
Additionally, the open contracts for XRP and those priced in USD have exceeded historical levels, with over 2 billion tokens (valued at over 2 billion USD at current prices) in futures positions used to bet on further market volatility.
