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XRP Drops 3.47% Amid Market Risk-Off, Weak ETF Flows

By CMC AI
July 28, 2026 at 1:04 AM UTC
XRP Drops 3.47% Amid Market Risk-Off, Weak ETF Flows

XRP’s Recent Decline: A Confluence of Factors

XRP’s 3.47 percentage-point drop over the last ~35 hours is best explained by a combination of broad-market risk-off, weakening XRP ETF flows, and a bearish technical setup around the 1.10-1.15 dollar band, rather than a single idiosyncratic shock.

Market-Wide Risk-Off Pulled Altcoins Lower

Over the last 24 hours, the total crypto market cap declined roughly 2.46%, from about 2.23 trillion dollars to 2.17 trillion dollars, while BTC dominance sat around 58.6% and altcoin market cap was stable near 899 billion dollars. This tells you:

  1. The move was not XRP-only. There was a broad market pullback, especially across higher beta assets.
  2. BTC dominance being flat while total market cap drops means both BTC and altcoins fell, with no big rotation from alts back into BTC.
  3. Derivatives open interest and funding did not spike in a way that signals an extreme liquidation event. Open interest rose modestly on some horizons, and funding drifted lower, which fits with a grind-down rather than a sudden crash.

Against that backdrop, XRP is down about 4.39% over 24 hours, from roughly 1.11 dollars in recent hourly prints to about 1.06 dollars now. That is a bit weaker than the total market but still in line with altcoins generally when the whole space is under pressure.

What this means: A significant slice of XRP’s 35-hour move is simply beta to a risk-off day in crypto, not something uniquely wrong with XRP.

ETF Flows And Technicals Turned Against XRP Near 1.10–1.15 Dollars

Several pieces of recent analysis around July 25–26 focus on a clear change in XRP-specific flows and chart structure in almost exactly the price region XRP has been losing during your window.

  1. Spot XRP ETF flows have weakened. A detailed Tokenpost update on July 26 reports that weekly net spot XRP ETF inflows have fallen to their lowest level since April, after earlier strong institutional demand pushed cumulative inflows to about 1.47 billion dollars by late June. The article notes that market participants now see ETF flows as “the main swing factor” for XRP price direction, and that continued weak inflows are likely to keep XRP range-bound rather than breaking higher toward 1.20–1.30 dollars.
  2. Price slid below key moving averages and RSI turned bearish. The same piece and a companion article state that:
  3. Price action over your window lines up with these levels. Over the last day or so XRP has traded down from around 1.11 dollars toward 1.06 dollars, which is a break under the 1.10 dollar psychological line and a test of the 1.05–1.09 support region analysts stressed. Volume around 1.24 billion dollars in 24 hours is not extreme, which fits a controlled trend lower as buyers step back rather than a panic dump.

What this means: As ETF inflows cooled and XRP sat under important EMAs, traders had a clear technical excuse to sell or cut risk around 1.10–1.15 dollars, and the last 35 hours look like that selling playing out into the 1.05–1.09 support zone.

Post-Catalyst “Sell The News,” Liquidations, And Consolidation

The 35-hour move also sits in a sequence of earlier events that were positive on paper but did not produce lasting upside for XRP. Coverage over July 21–26 highlights three threads that help explain why recent price action has been soft.

  1. “Sell the news” after MiCA CASP authorization and other regulatory wins. Reporting on July 24 notes that Ripple secured full CASP authorization under the EU’s MiCA framework from Luxembourg’s CSSF, which allows it to passport regulated services across the EEA and strengthens its institutional narrative. It also highlights MoonPay’s Discover partnership that makes it easier for U.S. cardholders to buy XRP. Despite that, XRP slipped about 2% on the day, and the article explicitly describes the reaction as a “sell-the-news” pattern, suggesting traders had pre-positioned into the announcement and took profits once it was confirmed.
  2. Ripple Mint and RLUSD raise utility questions for XRP. A separate analysis on July 25 ties heavy long liquidations in XRP futures roughly 2.12 million dollars in XRP liquidations over 24 hours, with a 2,205% imbalance toward longs to the launch of Ripple Mint, the institutional platform for managing Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin. While Ripple Mint and RLUSD are bullish for Ripple’s infrastructure, the piece notes that RLUSD can be used for settlement without always passing through XRP, which has sparked debate about XRP’s direct role in Ripple’s evolving strategy. That uncertainty, combined with long liquidation pressure and narrowing Bollinger Bands, left XRP pinned in a tight 1.06–1.10 dollar range.
  3. XRPL upgrades and AI or RWA activity are long-term positives, not short-term price drivers. Multiple recent articles describe:

These are all structurally bullish, but the same coverage stresses that near-term price remains dominated by ETF flows, technical levels, and broader market risk appetite. In other words, fundamentals are improving while the chart consolidates.

Putting this together with your window: by the time you look at the last 35 hours, the big positive headlines are already out. ETF inflows have decelerated, longs were recently liquidated, and traders are watching support bands rather than chasing upside. That is a classic environment where small market-wide risk-off days produce outsized moves in names that had previously run on narrative.

What this means: The recent 3.47 percentage-point move looks less like a reaction to a fresh headline and more like continuation of a post-news digestion phase, where profit-taking, earlier long unwinds, and range trading around support amplify a modest market-wide pullback.

Conclusion

There is no single, clean “event” that neatly explains XRP’s last 35 hours, such as a new lawsuit or a surprise delisting. Instead, the move lines up with three interacting forces. A risk-off day for crypto overall pulled the whole market down. Within that backdrop, XRP underperformed slightly because spot ETF inflows have cooled and price slipped below well-watched moving averages around 1.10–1.15 dollars, encouraging technical selling. And this all came right after a cluster of positive Ripple and XRPL headlines that appear to have been mostly sold into, with earlier long liquidations and consolidation leaving XRP vulnerable to downside follow-through when broader sentiment turned.

Confidence: Medium, because the evidence points to clear flow and technical drivers but there is no single dominant catalyst and intraday order-book data is not visible here.

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