Analyst says XRP could retest $1 before its next major rally

What happened

XRP's weekly close beneath its 20-week moving average has put a return to $1 back on the table, according to the analyst ChartNerd, who laid out the case in a video posted on X. In his view, weekly closes that keep landing below that trend line would open the door to a deeper retracement toward $1, where the largest cluster of leveraged positions since the market bottom sits.

A retest of that level could produce a double bottom, a structure the analyst compared with price action in 2022. Conversely, he said reclaiming and holding $1.33 would weaken the bearish setup.

The call arrives with XRP at about $1.33 on CoinGecko at the time of writing, up roughly 2% over 24 hours but down almost 3% on the week, 6% over 30 days and 45% over the past year, leaving it around 63% below its all-time high of $3.65. CryptoPotato reported the analyst's remarks.

ChartNerd's reading of the weekly chart runs like this: in the week of September 14, XRP wicked below the 20-week exponential moving average but closed above it, then climbed to the 50-week EMA near $1.50. That line has rejected price for nine to ten weeks, following a bounce of roughly 70% from a 98-cent low to $1.70, and the pullback since has been about 25%. He described the $1.30 area as a lifeline for bulls, adding that a reclaim of $1.33 would reopen a move toward $1.50, where a liquidity cluster sits near $1.55; clearing that range could point to $1.80 to $2.

Why it matters

The $1 region matters because two things converge there. The first is leveraged positioning, which the analyst says is concentrated at that level. The second is the monthly Gaussian Channel, an indicator that draws bands around long-term price trends. After earlier cycle peaks, XRP lost the upper band and returned to the middle band, which now sits at 98 cents. This cycle the upper band at $1.54 has capped price for three months and XRP has not yet visited the middle line, so a slide toward $1 would bring the token near that long-term indicator for the first time in the current cycle. Whether weekly closes stay below the 20-week line is the deciding trigger.

What the data shows

Exchange and on-chain figures offer a mixed picture. CryptoQuant data cited by CryptoPotato shows Binance withdrawals of under 10,000 XRP rising from 3% to 19.7% of outflow value between September 30 and October 20, the highest share since October 2024, while reserves across three major exchanges added 120 million XRP and spot XRP ETFs logged zero net flows on Monday.

Separately, Coinspeaker reported Santiment data showing XRP Ledger transfer volume reaching $49.66 billion on October 19 as the price held $1.25, roughly 6,000% above a baseline near $0.8 billion. Yet the entire day's transfers cost about $664 in fees, while spot exchange turnover was $1.47 billion, up 68% from the prior Sunday. Transfer volume counts every coin that moves, including exchange wallet shuffles, so it does not by itself establish new demand.

U.Today reported a separate measure: payment volume on the ledger jumped 2,633.3% in 24 hours to about 137.7 million XRP, but remained below a 30-day average of roughly 496 million XRP and far under an all-time high near 7 billion.

Background

The 2022 template is central to the analyst's argument. After losing the 20-week line that year, XRP bottomed, ran 90% into the 50-week EMA and fell back to its lows within a week or two. He sees a similar setup now, though his earlier downside targets of 90 to 70 cents never played out, and he was candid that he does not know what will happen.

Other analysts have published competing scenarios. Ali Martinez called a bottom on October 19 with a $2 target conditional on a steady close above $1.56, while a daily close below $1.2468 would invalidate that view in his framework, with $1.10 and then $1.05 below. ZyCrypto noted comparisons to XRP's 2024 advance and a cup-and-handle formation flagged by veteran trader Peter Brandt that points to $2.16 if a breakout occurs.

What to watch

The levels to track are the weekly close relative to the 20-week EMA, a reclaim of $1.33, the $1.50 to $1.55 liquidity zone, and any daily close beneath $1.2468. On the XRP/BTC three-month chart, the analyst notes that past outperformance against Bitcoin began from a lower demand zone while the pair has met the same horizontal resistance for six years, and he expects Bitcoin to take more of the spotlight in 2027. Exchange withdrawal patterns and ETF flows are the other data points worth following.

Questions readers ask