Ripple’s XRP ranks #3 among all non-stablecoin cryptocurrencies for market cap weight. The company claims that the coin is not just a speculative asset, but also a very powerful utility token. Ripple developed the XRP network and launched it in June 2012 to make it easy for large banks and corporations, and even governments, to send huge payments internationally. By Jan. 2018, however, it had become a popular altcoin among crypto markets and has remained so ever since. That 2017-18 price boom for XRP, moreover, briefly made its founder, Chris Larsen, a cryptocurrency billionaire on paper. So Could XRP Make Stout Investors in 2025 and 2026 Millionaires? The short answer is “no,” but let me elaborate, because there are reasons to be bullish. Bitcoin’s price may be a fair point of comparison. While BTC last traded at $2 in June 2011, by Oct. 5, 2025, it traded above $126,000 within a flash 24-hour window surge. That was a 63,000x increase in 14 years. In fact, every $1,000 invested so early in Bitcoin would now be worth $63 million. So, if XRP’s price continues on a trajectory like Bitcoin’s, then by 2039, it would produce a similar result. Of course, to anyone in the know, this seems absolutely ridiculous, and it most probably is. But a more realistic comparison is market cap. XRP’s Price Upside vs. BTC 2011 – 2025 In order for XRP’s market cap to reach the weight of BTC’s during its all-time high price level in Oct., it would require only a 20(x) or 1,900% increase from the December 14 value. That would take the current XRP market capitalization to Bitcoin’s two-and-a-half trillion dollar market cap at the very start of Q4 this fall. Does XRP have this much upside left in its business model’s addressable market and in its crypto market valuation? BTC did in 2011. Bitcoin was the first globally successful cryptocurrency, and its hardcore minimalist design fulfilled the simplest banking function with the most demand. Meanwhile, it did so in a way to build a native Internet monetary currency using digital broadcast techniques. Moreover, Bitcoin incorporated a powerful economic flywheel to drain capital from the global financial system, acting as a capital sink. Is XRP comparable? Here are some ways that it might be. Although let’s face it, nobody is becoming an XRP millionaire if they invested $1,000 today. The XRP / SWIFT Prediction In November, a report on Yahoo Finance touted that “XRP could capture 14% of SWIFT’s $150 trillion by 2030.” On-Demand Liquidity, Ripple’s automated payments service using XRP tokens, handled $1.3 trillion in Q2 of 2025. That could be something like $5.2 trillion annually. Instead of waiting days for transfers to clear via SWIFT, businesses only have to wait seconds for XRP’s network to settle. A fourfold increase in XRP’s volume for large cross-border payments over Q2’s pace would reach that 14% of the SWIFT market share at 2025 volumes. This could, in theory, create additional demand for XRP tokens and raise their market value, but the market doesn’t seem to perceive and value the possibility. But as the global economy grows, so does the number and volume of such transfers. Meanwhile, Ripple is aggressively expanding business operations to onboard customers that make large payments cross-border. They’re not just hanging a completely automated, very simple, low-bandwidth, but powerful digital money network out there and letting whoever uses it use it. XRPL: An Ethereum Worth of XRP Market Cap? Meanwhile, the XRP Ledger is developing the Ripple token’s use case as a programmable smart contract for safe and reliable transactions. It turns complete computation using someone else’s computers over the network into a metered, enabled service for new forms of cloud computing. In December, XRPL activity surged to record levels. The fast-growing popularity of this base-layer blockchain for smart contracts opens up an entirely new market, in addition to XRP’s original purpose as a lightweight yet powerful, high-throughput payment service that leverages the Internet’s capabilities. While XRP’s market cap was $122 billion on Dec. 14th, Ethereum’s was $375 billion. At the height of its market cap in Sept., Ethereum topped $555 billion. If XRP turned out to be an Ethereum killer, it could add something like half a trillion dollars to its market cap from growth in its smart contract segment alone. The post Is Ripple (XRP)’s Price Undervalued? Two Reasons to Consider (Opinion) appeared first on CryptoPotato .
