XRP’s 44% rally brings leverage back, raising risk of sharper pullback

$XRP's 44% rally over the past week has brought leverage rushing back into its derivatives market, just as the token starts to give up some of those gains.

Data from onchain analysis firm CryptoQuant's estimated leverage ratio for $XRP on Binance has climbed to about 0.21, its highest since January. The measure compares derivatives open interest with exchange reserves, with higher readings showing more leveraged exposure building relative to the amount of $XRP sitting on the venue.

On Binance, about two accounts were betting long on $XRP for every one betting short on Wednesday, CoinGlass data shows. Among top traders, the ratio was closer to three-to-one, while OKX accounts were running roughly two longs for every short.

$XRP futures generated about $6.4 billion of volume over the previous 24 hours, more than five times the roughly $1.2 billion traded on spot markets. Futures open interest stood at about $3.45 billion.

The leverage returned during $XRP's strongest stretch in months. A broad crypto rally began after the U.S. Treasury expanded its bond-buyback program last week, helping pull long-term yields lower and sending bitcoin from below $68,000 to nearly $80,000. $XRP outpaced bitcoin and most other major tokens as the move spread through the market.

$XRP also had a run of its own headlines. Ripple last week backed a new institutional credit fund that plans to make loans in its RLUSD stablecoin through the $XRP Ledger, while separate ledger data showed a growing share of $XRP activity taking place during the overlap between London and New York trading hours.

$XRP fell almost 5% over 24 hours to $1.44 on Wednesday after trading above $1.50 earlier.

With leverage at a seven-month high and $3.45 billion of open positions tilted heavily long, a deeper drop can force exchanges to close positions that no longer have enough collateral behind them. Those forced sales add to the decline, and enough of them happening together can turn an otherwise ordinary pullback into a much steeper one.

$XRP spent most of 2026 with its estimated leverage ratio at relatively low levels. The last time it sat here, in January, $XRP was trading above $2.