Whales Pocket 70M $XRP While Retail Argues About Inflation 🐳

Large XRP holders accumulated 70 million tokens over the past week, according to on-chain analytics firm Santiment, with data highlighted by crypto analyst Ali Martinez on July 16. The buying came as US Consumer Price Index and Producer Price Index reports showed continued cooling of inflation, providing macro support for risk assets including cryptocurrencies.

Martinez pointed to the increase in wallets holding between 1 and 10 million XRP as evidence of renewed accumulation by so-called whales during recent price dips. The accumulation unfolded against the backdrop of uncertainty surrounding US-Iran geopolitical tensions, yet sentiment among large holders remained net positive.

Separately, Santiment data referenced by CoinGape indicated that XRP is currently recording one of the highest bullish-to-bearish comment ratios in the crypto market, with 3.02 bullish comments for every single bearish comment, a pattern the analytics firm has previously associated with heightened retail FOMO. Binance's XRP reserves were also reported to have declined, a metric often interpreted as tokens moving off centralized exchanges into private wallets.

Derivatives markets echoed the spot-side activity. XRP futures open interest climbed to roughly $2.50 billion, reflecting a sharp increase in leveraged positioning as traders repositioned around the macro data and the whale accumulation narrative. The combination of cooling inflation prints, sustained whale buying, and rising futures open interest marked one of the more active weeks for XRP this quarter.