XRP’s price will skyrocket by over 500% to $12.50 in 2028, enabling the cryptocurrency’s market value to eclipse Ethereum’s.
That’s according to new research from Geoff Kendrick, global head of digital assets research at Standard Chartered Bank.
“That will make XRP the second-largest non-stablecoin digital asset,” wrote Kendrick in a Tuesday note.
Thus, XRP joins a group of cryptocurrencies that Standard Chartered expects to be the market’s big winners. Other members of that group include Bitcoin and Avalanche, while Ethereum is expected to be one of the losers.
The note adds to the bullish hype that has surrounded the Ripple-linked cryptocurrency over the past six months.
The hype has been fuelled by US President Donald Trump’s pro-crypto stance and the Securities and Exchange Commission having dropped its case against Ripple.
The case for XRP
Kendrick argued the XRP token and its associated public layer 1 blockchain, the XRP Ledger, are poised to benefit from tokenisation and the ability to facilitate cross-border and cross-currency payments, both fast-growing slices of the crypto pie.
Ripple says tokenisation will be a $19 trillion business by 2033.
“XRP is uniquely positioned at the heart of one of the fastest-growing uses for digital assets — facilitation of cross-border and cross-currency payments,” Kendrick wrote.
Ripple has enjoyed some good news lately.
The company’s founders helped develop the XRP Ledger, and made it open source in 2015.
Today, the firm still engages the XRPL developer community and provides it with tools, services, and infrastructure support.
The prospect of the SEC approving a spot XRP exchange-traded fund is seen as a potential big boon to the cryptocurrency.
Polymarket bettors give spot XRP ETFs a 77% chance of being approved in 2025.
Kendrick said he expected XRP ETFs to be approved between July and September.
He also estimated that those funds will generate between $4 billion and $8 billion in the first 12 months, echoing JPMorgan, which has made a similar estimate.
Ripple also recently announced a large deal with the United Arab Emirates, that will see its technology used in the Dubai International Financial Centre, itself the host of many crypto firms.
Challenges
To be sure, XRP’s price has dropped about 12% in the past week and punters on crypto-betting platform Polymarket bet it’s going to fall even more this month.
The drop is part of a wider crypto market wipeout that has shaved about 8.8%, or $251 billion, of the total market’s value over the past seven days, according to CoinGecko.
The trigger? Trump’s so-called “psychodrama” trade policies that have slammed some of the US’ closest trading partners, its rivals and even a bunch of penguins with fresh tariffs.
Even so, Kendrick argued that XRP and other cryptocurrencies will come out of the mess stronger than ever.
“Keep looking for winners and HODLing those you already own,” Kendrick said. “Tariff mess will be over soon, and Bitcoin’s solid performance during the noise tells us a leg higher for the asset class will follow.”
Andrew Flanagan is a markets correspondent for DL News. Have a tip? Reach out to aflanagan@dlnews.com.
