Xrp Flashes Historic Rebound Hint, But Buying Drops 85% — What’s Next For Price?

What Happened

Buying pressure has dropped sharply, long-term holders are pulling back, and leverage risks remain high. This creates a conflict between what the chart suggests and how investors are actually behaving.

That is an 85% collapse in buying pressure. This means investors are no longer reducing exchange balances at the same pace. Demand has weakened sharply, even as the chart flashed a bullish setup.

In simple terms, exchange balances are rising, clearly led by weakening long-term accumulation. The investors who usually support strong rebounds are staying cautious. But why?

Market Context

XRP price today is trading near $1.38, showing early signs of stabilization after weeks of weakness. On the chart, a familiar rebound pattern has started forming, similar to past setups that led to strong rallies. But on-chain and derivatives data are not confirming the optimism.

XRP Price Builds a Familiar Rebound Pattern

Between January 31 and February 11, the price made lower lows while the Relative Strength Index, or RSI, formed higher lows. RSI measures buying and selling strength. When price weakens, but RSI improves, it signals that selling pressure is fading and momentum may be turning.

At that time, XRP showed the same divergence before reclaiming the 20-period Exponential Moving Average (EMA) on January 2. After that reclaim, the price rallied over 28%. Now, the structure looks similar again. EMA is a trend indicator that gives more weight to recent prices to show short-term momentum.

In the Binance XRP/USDT perpetual market, medium-term liquidation data shows that short positions dominate. Over the next 30 days, short-side liquidation exposure stands near $148 million, while long-side exposure is closer to $83 million.

On the one-day timeframe, this time on Gate, long liquidations are near $63.9 million, while shorts are around $51 million. This means 30% more positions are currently exposed on the long side. If the XRP price drops even slightly, led by a weak and fearful market, long positions could be forced out quickly, leading to a deeper crash.

Why It Matters

The current divergence suggests that downside momentum is slowing. If XRP manages to reclaim the $1.50 zone, which aligns closely with the 20 EMA and prior resistance, it could attract stronger buying interest.

On-chain metrics explain why the rebound signal is struggling.

Derivatives Risk Explains Why Holders Are Hesitating

This shows that traders are leaning defensive and positioning for downside risk. Long-term holders seem to be siding with the majority here.

Details

Since late January, XRP has been forming a structure that previously preceded major recoveries.

A similar setup, also on the 12-hour chart, appeared in late December 2025.

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But the on-chain data does not support the rebound theory. At least, not yet.

Exchange Flows and Holders Show Buying Has Collapsed

One key indicator is Exchange Net Position Change. This measures how the total amount of XRP held on exchanges has changed over the past 30 days. In simple terms, it shows whether exchange balances are rising or falling on a monthly basis. When the number is strongly negative, exchange balances are shrinking, usually showing accumulation or outflows.

On February 8, XRP recorded net outflows of around 107 million tokens. By February 11, outflows had dropped to about 16 million tokens.

The same pattern appears in Hodler Net Position Change, which tracks wallets holding XRP for more than 155 days.

On February 1, long-term holders were adding around 337 million XRP. By February 11, their accumulation had fallen to about 128 million XRP.

That represents a drop of more than 60%.

Short-term positioning tells another story.