Most altcoins have headed south over the past several hours, and the second-largest is no exception.
XRP, which was among the top performers until yesterday evening, has plunged by double-digits to a new weekly low. As such, it has caused substantial losses to over-leveraged traders, even more than BTC.
What goes up, must come down, right? This narrative proved correct for Ripple’s cross-border token, which was in an ‘up only’ mode for over a week. Recall that the asset broke out of its consolidation range ($2.2-$2.3) where it spent a month or so last week and shot up above $3 in days.
The bulls kept the pressure on and, after more than seven years, XRP made history by breaking above its January 2018 all-time high of $3.4, and it set a new record at over $3.65. Thus, the cryptocurrency had gained more than 50% in a week or so, and its market cap flew past the $200 billion mark.
What followed were a few days of sideways trading between the previous and the latest ATHs. However, the bears took control in the past 12 hours or so, pushing XRP south hard.
In a matter of hours, the third-largest cryptocurrency plummeted from almost $3.6 to under $3.05, losing roughly 15% of its value. Although it has recovered some ground since then, it’s still down by over 11% daily.
This sudden but painful drop has resulted in a lot of pain for over-leveraged traders who were long on XRP. Data from CoinGlass shows that XRP longs were liquidated for over $93 million on a daily scale, which is second only to ETH and above BTC’s $70 million.