XRP Whales Control 68.5% of Supply as Senate Committee Clears CLARITY Act and Institutional Demand Surges

Large investors hold 68.5% of XRP supply, highest since 2018, as Senate committee passes CLARITY Act and spot ETFs see $18.5M daily inflow. XRP trades near $1.47 after testing $1.55.

Large investors are stacking XRP at a pace not seen in eight years, with wallets holding at least 10 million tokens now commanding 68.5% of the circulating supply — roughly 45.8 billion XRP. That concentration is the highest since May 2018. At the same time, the number of mid-tier wallets with 10,000 XRP or more hit a new record of around 332,230 addresses. The accumulation frenzy comes as XRP briefly broke above $1.55 this week before settling back to trade near $1.47, up roughly 6% on the week. Earlier data showed the token hovering around $1.43, just above its 50-day moving average of $1.39, with the relative strength index at a neutral 59.

The catalyst behind the move is partly regulatory. The US Senate Banking Committee passed the CLARITY Act on Thursday by a 15-9 vote. The bill would designate the Commodity Futures Trading Commission as the primary regulator for digital commodities, a shift that could pull XRP out of its long-standing regulatory gray area. Market observers now put the odds of final passage this year at over 70%. If enacted, analysts see the next resistance zones at $1.60 and $1.80, with a sustained move above $1.60 opening the path toward $2.

Institutional money is already flowing in. On the same day the CLARITY Act cleared committee, net inflows into spot XRP ETFs reached $18.5 million, bringing cumulative inflows to roughly $1.37 billion. The total assets under management for these products now exceed $1.2 billion. Bitwise and Canary Capital were among the biggest buyers. Meanwhile, Moscow Exchange launched XRP futures under the ticker MOEXXRP on May 14, targeting professional traders. On the XRP Ledger, the network processed about 71 million transactions in April — a 65% jump year-over-year. CEO Brad Garlinghouse noted the system has handled over 4 billion trades, each settling in three to five seconds.

Seoul is also making its presence felt. On South Korea’s Upbit exchange, XRP’s 24-hour trading volume hit roughly $330 million, surpassing that of Bitcoin and Ethereum combined. The frenzy on Korean platforms even briefly pushed XRP’s volume ahead of Bitcoin’s.

But the heightened attention has drawn scammers. Ripple Chief Technology Officer David Schwartz warned of a surge in deepfake airdrop offers on Instagram and Telegram, where attackers use AI-generated videos to trick users into sharing private wallet information. Schwartz stressed that Ripple never distributes free tokens and will never ask for wallet credentials. Individual losses from such schemes have reached up to 6,000 XRP.

With the CLARITY Act advancing, whales accumulating at an eight-year high, and institutional products gaining traction, XRP is facing a confluence of forces that could determine its next major move. The key technical hurdle remains the $1.51-$1.57 resistance band, tested repeatedly since February without a clean breakout. Above $1.60, the token would have room to retest the $2 level.