Amidst the crypto rout that has seen bitcoin hit three-month lows, the XRP price is swimming against the tide.
In the last 24 hours, the no. 3 cryptocurrency has registered gains of 7%.
Per CoinMarketCap, XRP has appreciated by roughly 7% to reach $0.2577 per coin, making it the biggest gainer among the top ten cryptocurrencies.
Despite the jump, the XRP price is still below the monthly high of $0.3225 recorded on Sept. 18. The XRP price has also fallen by nearly 50% since the yearly high registered in June.
Is XRP Being Boosted by Ripple’s Acquisition Spree?
The XRP price rise coincides with Ripple announcing an expansion of its European operations. In a blog post, Ripple unveiled Monday that it was acquiring an Iceland-based cryptocurrency trading company Algrim. Ripple will consequently absorb Algrim’s talent as part of its wider ambition to turn Iceland into one of its engineering hubs.
Following the acqui-hire, the Algrim team will now contribute in developing the cross-border-payments-focused On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) product. Besides developing a crypto trading platform, which has been integrated in over 30 markets, Algrim’s engineering team has also built trading platforms for traditional assets such as foreign exchange.
Growing the Human Resource Base
The jump in XRP’s price also comes less than a week since Ripple made another acquisition. On Sept. 27, Ripple announced it had purchased turnkey payments firm Logos. Just like Algrim, the purchase of Logos was more of an acqui-hire.
The Logos team will, however, not be assigned to the ODL product but rather to Xpring, a Ripple initiative intended to “invest in, incubate, acquire and provide grants to companies and projects run by proven entrepreneurs.” The purpose of the initiative is to grow the XRP and the XRP ledger ecosystem. So far Ripple has committed more than $500 million to this initiative. The Logos team will be stationed at Ripple’s New York Office.
