XRP's Market Cap Momentarily Zoomed to Trillions of Dollars on Gemini

XRP temporarily surged to $50 on crypto exchange Gemini, which rocketed the token's market capitalization to trillions of dollars if only for a few minutes.

Prices shot up to those levels for a few minutes at 20:30 UTC on Thursday before immediately reverting to parity with the spot markets on other exchanges.

The bump, which took a few seconds to correct, was likely a result of low liquidity in the hours following a token relisting on Gemini, during which a buyer may have placed an outsized market order — which was filled at an outrageously high price.

As such, XRP traded at levels higher than the broader market for at least a few hours, price chat data shows.

Some market observers opined a seller placed a spoof order at $50 per XRP, which was unintendedly filled by a buyer who may have “fat-fingered” the trade.

Market depth data shows XRP liquidity on Gemini remains relatively low, with only a $37,000 order required to move prices by 2% on the exchange. In contrast, the same price move on Binance would require at least $2.2 million.

The token was relisted on Gemini after July’s court order in favor of Ripple Labs, with a federal judge ruling that the “offer and sale of XRP on digital asset exchanges did not amount to offers and sales of investment contracts.” In 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Ripple Labs on allegations that Ripple sold XRP to U.S. customers without adequate registration.

At the time of writing, XRP was trading at 63 cents.