A fresh XRP market debate is underway after crypto analyst Ali Martinez said whales sold or redistributed 1.10 billion XRP over the past week. It is a figure that quickly caught the attention of traders watching whether large holders are trimming exposure or simply repositioning coins off exchanges. The timing matters because XRP is trading around $1.39 today, down about 2.02% over the past 24 hours, with a market value near $85.6 billion and daily trading volume close to $1.95 billion, according to CoinMarketCap.
The whale transfer chatter is landing at a delicate moment for XRP. Major cryptocurrencies were slipping today as crypto sentiment cooled alongside broader market hesitation. Today’s pullback follows a month in which XRP has struggled to build on earlier strength, even as traders continue to search for a durable catalyst.
Price action on the chart does not yet suggest a clean breakout. XRP fell below its 50-day exponential moving average at $1.41 and was trading below $1.40, while the 100-day EMA sits at $1.52 and the 200-day EMA is further overhead at $1.75. Immediate support is near $1.30, with resistance around $1.41, $1.52, and $1.60. In other words, the market is still inside a narrow corridor where neither bulls nor bears have fully taken control.
That technical backdrop helps explain why whale activity is drawing so much focus. Large holders can often influence sentiment long before price confirms a move, especially in assets like XRP, where flow data is watched almost as closely as candle patterns. Recent on-chain reporting has been mixed, which is part of the reason the market is reading Martinez’s message in different ways.
One CryptoQuant report explained that whales were “waiting for a rally to sell” in XRP. There is also evidence that some XRP is still leaving exchanges, which usually suggests investors are moving coins into self-custody rather than preparing to dump them immediately.
As per data from Santiment, 34.94 million XRP left exchanges in a single 24-hour period on April 24, marking one of the largest daily outflow events of 2026. However, some experts tied the move to a bullish interpretation of shrinking sell-side supply. That does not erase the possibility of distribution by whales, but it does show that not all large movements should be read the same way.
Hope Amid Pressure
Institutional products have kept the XRP conversation alive in 2026 as well. In January, spot XRP ETFs were seeing steady inflows after launch, and asset managers were filing for ETFs tied to XRP and other altcoins, alongside the CME futures rollout.
It was reported last year that Ripple-backed Evernorth planned to raise more than $1 billion to build an XRP treasury, underlining how the token has become central to a growing institutional narrative rather than a purely retail one.
Still, the market remains trapped between optimism and caution. CoinMarketCap shows XRP is sitting far below its all-time high of $3.65 and is only a fraction of the way back from the lows it has seen over the past year. The 52-week range from $0.3865 to $3.6556 shows just how wide XRP’s trading band has been over the last 12 months.
That kind of range tends to invite aggressive speculation whenever whales move size, because traders are constantly hunting for the next inflection point. What makes Martinez’s latest comment especially interesting is the ambiguity within the word “redistributed.”
In crypto, a whale outflow can mean selling, but it can also mean reshuffling coins across wallets, exchanges, custody providers, or internal treasury structures. That is why the same data can sometimes fuel opposite narratives. Bears see a warning sign that large players are reducing exposure.
Bulls see supply rotation, self-custody, or strategic repositioning before the next leg up. The current XRP tape supports both interpretations, which is why the market has stayed cautious even with periodic bursts of bullish on-chain activity.
For now, XRP traders are watching the $1.30 area as the first meaningful line of defense, while $1.41 remains the nearby level the market needs to reclaim before sentiment can improve materially. A move back through $1.52 would help shift the tone, but until then, the token is still trading in a zone where whale behavior can swing expectations faster than price itself.
If Martinez’s 1.10 billion XRP figure reflects real distribution rather than wallet housekeeping, it could add pressure to an already fragile chart. If it is mostly redistribution, the market may eventually treat the move as noise. Either way, the next few sessions are likely to tell traders which story is closer to the truth.
