Although BTC has recovered slightly from the weekend slumber and sits above $64,000, Ripple’s native token has failed to join the rather modest ride and continues to fight for the $1.00 support; however, it’s from the downside now.

Fresh on-chain data shared by popular crypto analyst Ali Martinez showed that this hasn’t deterred large investors from growing louder amid these market struggles.

XRP Whales Are Back

Fresh on-chain data cited by popular crypto analyst Ali Martinez indicated that whale activity on the XRP Ledger has exploded over the past 24 hours to new local peaks. More precisely, the number of XRP transactions worth over $1 million has surged by 280% to nearly 40. For reference, the number of such transactions during the previous two days stood at around 10.

This sudden activity spike comes only a few days after another significant whale development in which addresses holding between 10 million and 100 million XRP accumulated approximately 72 million tokens in a single day. At the time, this was worth roughly $72 million.

These are numerous signs that network activity has picked up the pace lately and strengthened considerably. Another signal for this came last week when the XRP Ledger recorded nearly 50,000 active addresses within 24 hours, which became a multi-month peak. At the same time, the social sentiment surrounding the native token deteriorated to a three-month low.

Simply put, activity among network users and some of Ripple’s biggest participants is moving in the right direction, while the price of the cross-border token is not.

XRP Still Struggles at Key Support

XRP’s recent slumber is more concerning to investors as the asset slipped by 1% in the past 24 hours to trade just under the crucial psychological support at $1.00. The derivatives market paints another conflicting picture, as the token’s open interest recently approached levels last seen around the massive October 10 liquidation event. In addition, CryptoQuant flagged rising selling pressure on Binance.

The battle for $1.00 appears to be favoring the bears, as long traders have absorbed considerably larger liquidation losses during XRP’s repeated attempts to defend that level.

Consequently, the returning whale activity becomes even more intriguing, as this 280% surge in large transactions doesn’t reveal whether whales were buying or selling. It shouldn’t necessarily be interpreted as accumulation, but when combined with last week’s major purchases and overall rising XRPL activity, it shifts the broader perspective to a more promising one.

Source: CryptoPotato