XRP holders are digesting two very different signals this week. On the infrastructure side, the XRP Ledger is once again closing ledgers at its usual pace after a stretch of sluggish performance, following the rollout of a recommended configuration change by node operators while developers readied a software fix in parallel. On the market side, CryptoQuant data shows exchange reserves hovering near their yearly high — a setup that keeps the prospect of selling pressure alive even as the token trades higher.
The price is up 0.9% today at USD 1.32, a move that on its own says nothing about the network’s recovery. A separate reading put the daily advance at 1.7%; either way, the gain is no proof that traders are reacting to the restored block times.
A Fix That Waits on Validators
Restoring normal throughput is not the same as closing out the technical work. The short-term operational step and the planned software patch serve distinct purposes, and the vote on the security amendment remains a process of its own.
Support for the fixCleanup3_4_0 amendment dipped below the required threshold on Wednesday, which restarted the mandatory 14-day approval window. The earliest conditional activation date is now November 4. The word “conditional” carries the weight here: backing must hold for the entire period, and the interim rebound in support does not substitute for that requirement.
The package addresses a loophole in token creation along with adjustments to vault and lending calculations. It does not switch on the separate lending system, which has yet to attract enough support to begin its own activation process.
Distinct from all of this is the XRP Ledger’s security notice published October 9, which described an overflow bug in payment handling that could have allowed the creation of additional spendable XRP. According to the network’s report, the flaw had already been patched, and the disclosure flagged no new attack.
Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying XRP?
Exchange Balances at the 99th Percentile
CryptoQuant puts roughly 11.81 billion XRP on trading platforms — the 99th percentile of the past year, meaning holdings sit at the upper edge of the range observed over that stretch. The distinction between risk and realized selling matters: swollen reserves feed worries about extra supply, but they do not by themselves prove those tokens have changed hands.
Transfers from large holders to Binance add another layer. Media reports pegged those inflows at a monthly average of USD 112.4 million, the highest since March, with single-day flows topping USD 400 million. Such moves could point to profit-taking during the rally. Lately, though, the inflows have normalized again — a sign of easing pressure from those transfers, without canceling out the elevated total reserves. The two observations cover different slices of the market.
ETF Flows Cut Both Ways
US spot XRP ETFs present a similarly mixed picture. On Wednesday the funds booked net inflows of USD 708,510. Franklin Templeton’s XRPZ took in USD 2.25 million, while USD 1.55 million flowed out of Bitwise’s fund. The positive headline balance thus masks offsetting decisions within the product group — evidence of demand, but not of uniformly bullish ETF positioning. Before that, the funds had logged two consecutive trading days without any movement.
Reliability as the Real Test
Technical steadiness is gaining weight as integration plans stack up. Cross River said on October 15 that it would embed Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin into its core banking system, with support for transactions on the XRP Ledger. Ripple’s October 14 collaboration with Privy takes aim at network access, letting developers embed XRP Ledger wallets directly into applications and supporting transactions in XRP, RLUSD and other assets on the network.
These initiatives are separate from the approval of individual protocol changes. For investors, the count of new connections is only part of the story. Just as important is whether the network runs reliably and whether necessary fixes clear their designated approval hurdles. The recent normalization marks operational progress — not the end of the technical work. And with exchange reserves still near their peak, the calmer inflow data will need to hold before the selling-risk question can be set aside.
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