Ripple witnessed 500 million XRP being released from escrow in response to demand in May, and the latest escrow unlock occurred during a period of XRP price volatility.
Data from XRPL explorer Bithomp shows that the transaction took place at 02:15 AM (UTC) today, in line with standard procedures for escrow unlocking. The executor is the OffEscrowerOfDai account, which is often involved in such processes and is known for its unusual notes.
Notably, the recipient address also received 500 million XRP in last month’s escrow execution, but has held onto those tokens until now. Therefore, after the latest release, the address now holds 1 billion XRP worth more than $500 million.
On-chain data shows that the address holds 4 billion XRP in escrow, scheduled to be released monthly until January 2025. In total, Ripple now has 39 billion XRP tokens locked in eight custodial wallets, representing 39% of the total XRP supply.
The anomaly in Ripple’s escrow unlock is worth noting. A trend observed this year is that the most recent escrow unlock only released 500 million tokens instead of the 1 billion tokens in the standard procedure. Although the escrow execution program arranges for the release of 1 billion XRP on the first day of every month, this is not always the case.
Last month, Ripple released only 500 million XRP. Nearly a week later, on April 12, the escrow wallet unlocked another 500 million tokens. Meanwhile, only 500 million XRP tokens were released in March. The second transaction to release the remaining tokens encountered an error.
Furthermore, in February, Ripple released 600 million XRP on the first day of the month and 400 million tokens on February 25. The standard procedure of escrow release was recorded only in January this year. However, Ripple continues to lock up 800 million XRP per month.
It’s important to mention that while Ripple has set its escrow wallet to release 1 billion tokens at midnight on the first day of every month, these releases only occur when triggered by an external party. Sometimes, these parties are unable to execute transactions, causing delays.
Meanwhile, the latest unlock comes at a time when XRP is struggling to hold onto the psychological support of $0.50 per share, amid increased market volatility. Bitcoin fell below $60,000, driving the market lower, after a U.S. court reportedly sentenced Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) to four months in prison.
Nonetheless, XRP has performed fairly consistently over the past 24 hours and is currently trading at $0.5020. Meanwhile, Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) fell by 5.54% and 5.94% respectively, while XRP fell by only 2.69% in the same time frame. Additionally, Solana (SOL) fell by 8.22% and Dogecoin (DOGE) fell by 8.52%.
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