Can XRP reclaim $3 and beyond? ETF inflows hit a January high at $1.47

Spot XRP ETFs have quietly amassed $1.35 billion in net inflows on the back of Ripple’s JPMorgan‑backed tokenized Treasuries tests.

Five U.S.-listed spot XRP (XRP) ETFs pulled in a combined $25.8 million on Monday, the biggest single-day haul since January 5, 2026, according to data reported by CoinDesk. Franklin Templeton’s XRPZ led the pack with $13.6 million, followed by the Bitwise XRP ETF at $7.6 million and Grayscale’s GXRP at $4.6 million, collectively lifting cumulative net inflows since the products launched to $1.35 billion.

Record ETF inflows signal shifting XRP narrative

Analysts and market observers are tying the inflow spike directly to a cluster of Ripple announcements rather than macro tailwinds alone. Ripple closed a $200 million debt financing round to scale Ripple Prime, its institutional brokerage platform, signaling that the company views professional custody and settlement services as the next growth vector beyond retail XRP trading. More concretely, Ripple completed a live tokenized settlement test for U.S. Treasury bonds on the XRP Ledger in partnership with JPMorgan Chase, Mastercard and Ondo Finance — the full redemption cycle taking under five seconds — a demonstration that on-chain settlement infrastructure built around XRP can operate at institutional speed and alongside some of the largest names in traditional finance. Ripple also published a “four-phase roadmap” to make the XRP Ledger quantum-resistant by 2028, including an emergency zero-knowledge proof mechanism to recover funds in extreme scenarios, appealing to institutions doing decade-long infrastructure planning.

A previous crypto.news story on Ondo Finance’s tokenized stock bridge noted how the RWA ecosystem is increasingly gravitating toward chains that can demonstrate fast, compliant settlement, while another story on DTCC’s tokenized securities push with over 50 institutions shows the same institutional appetite for on-chain rails that Ripple is now trying to capture with the XRP Ledger.

At $1.47, what does the road back to $3 look like

The inflow data paints a constructive picture. The problem is that price has not caught up. XRP is currently trading around $1.47, down roughly 39% over the past six months and nearly 60% off the July 2025 high of approximately $3.65, even as ETF products accumulate $1.35 billion in net new capital. That divergence suggests institutional flows are being absorbed by existing holders rotating out rather than driving a clean supply squeeze, and it points to the core tension in any XRP price forecast: the infrastructure story is building, but the market is still digesting a significant overhang from last cycle’s peak.

For a path back toward $3, analysts broadly point to three conditions that need to converge. First, ETF inflows would need to sustain or accelerate beyond the current $25.8 million single-day record, ideally with a broader retail re-engagement driven by the institutional narrative rather than a meme cycle. Second, live deployments on the XRP Ledger — beyond tests — involving JPMorgan, Mastercard or similarly systemically important names would need to demonstrate real-world volume, giving the “infrastructure token” thesis an auditable on-chain footprint rather than just press releases. Third, the macro environment around rates and risk appetite would need to shift in crypto’s favor, since XRP has historically amplified both Bitcoin’s rallies and its drawdowns.

On the bear side, the 39% six-month decline despite sustained ETF flows is a warning that narrative momentum alone cannot prop up price when broader crypto markets are range-bound and leveraged longs from the 2025 peak are still unwinding. A crypto.news price prediction roundup noted that XRP’s correlation to Bitcoin remains high enough that any renewed BTC weakness toward $60,000 — a level technical analysts flagged on X as a possible Wyckoff retest zone — could drag XRP back toward $1.10 to $1.20 before any structural recovery takes hold.

The most credible medium-term bull case puts XRP back in the $2.50 to $3.50 range by late 2026 if Ripple Prime gains traction as an institutional on-ramp, the tokenized Treasury settlement pipeline generates measurable on-chain volume, and the U.S. regulatory environment codifies XRP’s status as a non-security commodity under the Clarity Act now heading to markup. That scenario is not guaranteed, but it is increasingly supported by the kind of institutional infrastructure moves — ETF products, bank partnerships, quantum-resistance planning — that tend to precede rather than follow price recovery in assets transitioning from speculative to structural narratives.