Why Ripple’s $16 trillion payment volume isn’t boosting XRP

Buying XRP doesn’t give you shares in Ripple, although the company’s growing list of new ventures and financial partners makes it easy to assume their fortunes should move together.Ripple can earn a lot of money from those relationships without passing a dollar to token holders, who have no claim on its profits.XRP did rise during the latest round of announcements, climbing from $1.29 on Oct. 25 to $1.32 on Oct. 28, a small gain (but still a gain) of about 2.3%. However, that still left it roughly 11% below its September close, despite another week of recognizable names signing up for Ripple’s services.Over the same September-to-October window, Bitcoin lost about 2.7%, while Ethereum fell approximately 12.2%, so XRP wasn’t unusually weak compared with every major cryptocurrency.XRP and Ethereum lost more than Bitcoin in OctoberCumulative percentage returns from each asset's Sept. 30, 2026 USD closing price. All three start at 0%. CryptoQuant All Exchanges spot prices; daily closes with UTC dates. Returns are rounded to two decimals.Sep. 30, 2026 – Oct. 28, 2026Chart by CryptoSlateThat's why the price action doesn't really tell us what holders and traders think about these announcem...