of $XRP Ledger is busier than ever, but traders still haven’t caught up.
The number of successful transactions per day on XRPL recently reached a 12-month high of more than 2.7 million, up from about 1 million in late 2025, according to XRPSCAN data. The network processes 20-2.8 million transactions per day at 20-26 transactions per second.
The automated market maker pool has exploded to nearly 27,000 active pools supporting over 16,000 unique tokens. According to RWA.xyz, the value of tokenized real-world assets on the ledger increased by 35% in the past 30 days to $461 million. Stablecoin transfers amounted to $1.19 billion during the same period.
$XRP is trading at $1.37, down 26% since the beginning of the year. It is 62% below its late 2025 high of $3.65.
The gap between what the ledger is doing and what the token is doing is $XRP At this point, that’s a question the market has yet to answer.
Standard cryptographic theory is that network activity increases the value of a token. More usage means more demand for the native asset, which causes the price to rise. This is the framework that worked for Ethereum during the DeFi summer and Solana during the meme coin boom.
but $XRP Breaking the pattern. All important indicators for utility tokens are rising, but the price is falling.
The most likely explanation is structural. The growth of XRPL activity is increasingly driven by RLUSD, Ripple’s stablecoin, and tokenized assets in circulation. $XRP Although it can be used as a bridge currency, it does not create sustainable demand for the token.
payment using $XRP Taking 3 seconds to settle a cross-border transaction between fiat currencies does not create the same kind of buying pressure as someone staking ETH for months or locking SOL into a DeFi protocol. The network becomes congested, but the tokens remain liquid and ephemeral. Activity increases, but scarcity does not.
This is clear when you look at the DeFi numbers. According to DeFiLlama, the total amount of XRPL is pegged at $47.54 million. This is the entire DeFi ecosystem on-chain with a native token market capitalization of $84 billion.
For comparison, Solana has a TVL of about $4 billion. Ethereum has over $40 billion in assets. $XRPThe DeFi layer suffers from rounding errors relative to its valuation, meaning its market capitalization is still overwhelmingly driven by speculative positioning and ETF expectations rather than capital locked into productive on-chain activity.
Native DEXs tell a similar story. Recent data shows daily volume between $4 million and $8 million, which is modest for any Layer 1, and especially small for a Layer 1 that ranks 5th in market capitalization.
AMM pool growth is real, with 27,000 pools and 12 million pools $XRP However, the dollar value of that liquidity remains thin compared to the size of the token market.
The RWA situation is one area where the data truly supports the bullish case. With $461 million in distributed asset value and $1.5 billion in expressed asset value, XRPL outperforms several large chains in certain tokenization categories.
The stablecoin on the ledger has a market capitalization of $339 million and 35,800 owners. The 30-day RWA transfer volume was $149 million, an increase of over 1,300%, suggesting real institutional activity rather than wash trading. If the theory of tokenization plays out over the next few years, XRPL will gain a foothold that most competitors do not have.
As such, March returns have historically averaged 18%. $XRPand the $1.27 to $1.30 support zone has held through multiple tests. If the macro situation stabilizes and the Iran conflict progresses towards resolution, there is a possibility that the price will rebound above $1.60 as a relief measure.
