Ripple's October 1 billion XRP unlock stays untouched as Swell opens

What happened

The 1 billion XRP that Ripple's escrow contracts released on Oct. 1 is still sitting where it landed. A ledger review published by 99Bitcoins on Oct. 27 found that four escrow contracts paid out to two Ripple wallets that XRPScan labels "Ripple 10" and "Ripple 11", 500 million XRP each, and that neither wallet had sent a payment in the 26 days since.

The pause has run alongside a heavy corporate calendar. Ripple opened its Swell 2026 conference in New York on Tuesday, Oct. 27, one day after the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency granted final approval for Ripple National Trust Bank. The charter gives Ripple a federally supervised vehicle to hold segregated reserves backing its RLUSD stablecoin and to provide digital-asset custody to enterprises.

More tokens are due within days. Each of the two wallets holds a further 500 million XRP in escrow that matures on Sunday, Nov. 1, meaning roughly 2 billion unlocked coins could be sitting across the pair by the weekend. Finbold reported that Ripple has unlocked and not relocked 3 billion XRP so far in 2026 and is set to receive another 1 billion on Nov. 1.

Why it matters

The supply question carries more weight than usual because XRP has been weak. 99Bitcoins put the token's one-month decline at 15.8%, while Finbold measured a drop of more than 13% over 30 days. An untouched unlock is not a promise that Ripple will hold: the company can relock the coins or move them once Swell ends, which is why the two Ripple wallets, rather than exchange balances, are the addresses to watch this week.

What the data shows

Large holders are accumulating even as the price sags. Santiment counted wallets holding at least 10 million XRP at 46.87 billion tokens, about 68.5% of supply, the largest share for that cohort since November 2022. Analyst Ali Martinez noted that the 10 million to 100 million band shrank from 351 wallets to 339 between Oct. 19 and Oct. 25, so the growth sits at the very top. CryptoQuant recorded 6.05 billion XRP sent to exchanges in the 30 days to Oct. 19, the most since March, while the 90-day average of whale withdrawals fell to $49.7 million, the lowest since October 2021. U.S. spot XRP ETFs lost $3.61 million on Monday, all from Bitwise's fund, which holds $1.47 billion in assets.

Price action remains soft. XRP closed at $1.3092 on Binance and traded near $1.2990, below both its 50-day exponential moving average of $1.3601 and its 200-day EMA of $1.3709, according to 99Bitcoins. Finbold, citing XRPSCAN, put Ripple's escrow at 35.4 billion XRP worth about $46.72 billion, with roughly 4.05 billion more in other Ripple accounts, for 39.45 billion under company control.

Background

Monthly escrow releases have framed XRP supply since late 2017. In 2026 Ripple has followed a pattern of re-escrowing about 700 million of each 1 billion unlock, roughly 70%, into new contracts and retaining around 300 million for operations, On-Demand Liquidity corridors and partner distributions, Finbold reported. Institutional ties have widened at the same time: BNY expanded its Ripple relationship on Oct. 27 to custody XRP and RLUSD for eligible clients, Robinhood announced a partnership the same day covering RLUSD settlement on the XRP Ledger and Ripple Treasury, and Cross River Bank integrated RLUSD on Oct. 15. The Crypto Basic cautioned that no announcement ties Ripple or XRP to the government-backed programs those firms also serve.

What to watch

Whether Ripple 10 and Ripple 11 stay quiet after Swell is the nearest test. A transfer out of either wallet, or a decision to re-escrow the matured tranches, would say more about October's supply outlook than any conference appearance. The Nov. 1 maturity gives the company a fresh choice within days.

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