Ripple Sticks With XRP As Its Main Strategic Asset
Ripple made it clear that it is still committed to XRP for the long term. CEO Brad Garlinghouse called the token the company’s “North Star.” He said this after a year of aggressive mergers, acquisitions, and ecosystem investments that were meant to make institutional infrastructure stronger around the world.
Garlinghouse stressed that the main goal of every major Ripple product, such as payments, custody, liquidity tools, and stablecoin projects, is to make XRP more useful. This alignment is part of a bigger plan to speed up transactions and make the XRP Ledger look like enterprise-grade financial infrastructure.
$4B Acquisition Spree Reshapes Ripple’s Market Position
In 2025, Ripple spent about $4 billion on strategic deals, making it one of the most aggressive corporate investors in the crypto sector. The company focused on platforms that could speed up the adoption of blockchain technology by businesses while also adding services that are directly related to blockchain-based finance ecosystems.
One of the biggest purchases was Hidden Road for $1.25 billion. It was later renamed Ripple Prime to support institutional clearing. GTreasury, now known as Ripple Treasury, was involved in another big deal. They offered risk management, foreign exchange tools, compliance frameworks, and enterprise liquidity solutions.
Integration Takes Priority Before New Deals Resume
Even though they spent a lot of money last year, leadership said that 2026 will mostly be about integrating the businesses they bought instead of looking for more deals. Garlinghouse said that big purchases are unlikely to happen in the near future, but he did say that the company could look into expansion opportunities again later.
This break shows that Ripple is being careful with its money and is waiting to see how its operations work together before making more investments. Analysts think that the integration phases are very important for making sure that acquisitions lead to revenue growth instead of just being costly strategic experiments.
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XRP Price Weakness Clouds Otherwise Aggressive Expansion
Ripple is growing its business quickly, but XRP is still trading far below its all-time highs, almost 60% below its peak value. The difference between how well companies are doing and how well tokens are doing has sparked a debate about whether institutional initiatives really drive demand.
People in the market are still cautious because they see that macro risk sentiment and a lower appetite for speculation are still hurting digital assets in general. Price action may not be able to show the operational progress that Ripple often talks about until stronger inflows come in.
Technical Signals Suggest Recovery Faces Heavy Resistance
XRP has recently bounced back a little after a big drop that brought prices down to the $1.15-$1.20 range. Technical indicators suggest that things might stabilize in the short term, but analysts say that momentum is still weak across many chart frameworks.
During the drop, the Parabolic SAR flipped below the price, which is often seen as an early sign that selling pressure may ease for a short time. The Supertrend, on the other hand, is still well above current levels, which supports the bearish structure that has been in place on longer-term charts.
Important Support and Resistance Levels Affect Outlook
Support near $1.15-$1.20 has held up so far, but if it breaks down, the $1 level could become very important. Traders usually keep a close eye on these round-number levels because when they are broken, it can lead to algorithmic selling and more volatility.
On the plus side, there seems to be a lot of resistance between $1.45 and $1.50. After that, there are stronger barriers between $1.70 and $1.80. For XRP to keep going up, it will probably need to defend the $1.30 area and keep making higher lows during pullbacks.
Can Utility Growth Translate Into Investor Confidence?
Ripple’s leaders say that increasing the usefulness of the currency in the real world will ultimately support its long-term value and boost investor confidence in all market cycles. But people are still skeptical, mostly because past announcements about infrastructure haven’t always led to immediate price increases.
The main question now is whether more products, institutional rails, and treasury capabilities will lead to more demand for tokens. If adoption picks up speed, XRP could prove Garlinghouse’s North Star thesis right, but investors still need to be convinced.
