Ripple, a San Francisco-based Blockchain company, yesterday published its quarterly XRP Markets Report and highlighted the growing demand for XRP in Q1 of 2021. The company’s total XRP sales reached $150.34 million during the first quarter of 2021, which is a jump of approximately 97% compared to Q4 of 2020.
According to the official announcement, global XRP volume jumped significantly during the first quarter of this year. Ripple mentioned the role of key on-demand liquidity (ODL) customers in the recent surge of XRP sales.
During the last quarter, Ripple accelerated its global expansion through several partnerships with companies around the world. The blockchain firm acquired a 40% stake in Tranglo, one of Asia’s leading cross-border payment firms. During a recent interview with Reuters, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse mentioned that the company is growing in Asia, and the activity of XRP liquidity (XRPL) has increased significantly in the region.
“Ripple continued to engage in sales to support ODL and key infrastructure partners as part of providing increased XRPL to improve the ODL experience of certain customers, eliminating the need for pre-funding and enabling instant global Payments . Total sales by Ripple, net of purchases, ended the quarter at 7 bps or 0.07% of global XRP volume according to CryptoCompare TopTier (CCTT) volumes,” Ripple mentioned in the official announcement.
XRP Accumulation
During the latest report, Ripple highlighted a significant spike in the number of whale addresses. The company mentioned that the number of wallets holding between 1 million and 10 million XRP increased from 1,125 to 1,196 during the first quarter. According to the company, 319 crypto wallets are holding at least 10 million XRP.
Since the start of this year, crypto whales have accelerated the movement of the world’s fifth-largest cryptocurrency in large amounts. According to crypto analytics firm Whale Alert, a leading XRP whale account moved 6 million coins from digital exchange, Kraken to an unknown crypto wallet on 6 May at 16:23 UTC. As of writing, the world's fifth-largest digital currency is trading near $1.57.
