XRP, the cryptocurrency developed by Ripple Labs, sometimes has big, unexplained price jumps. These idiosyncrasies make this investible digital asset all the more mesmerizing. These irregularities, in which XRP’s price is incorrectly shown, have recently been the subject of public chatter by market participants. The funniest glitches are on TradingView, CoinMarketCap, and the MEXC exchange.
Recent TradingView Display Error
As we previously reported, just last month TradingView’s default interface incorrectly showed XRP trading at $9,864. That represented an amazing premium from an expected price of approximately $0.20-$0.22 at the time in the actual market. The issue was limited to TradingView’s platform. Legacy exchanges and other price data aggregators were reporting the true market value.
The incident sent alarm bells ringing amongst traders and investors. Watchdogs worried about the accuracy of data collected from states’ various sources. As vividly illustrated by the TradingView glitch, it’s crucial to double-check any information you find across multiple independent platforms.
CoinMarketCap System Errors
In December 2021, CoinMarketCap suffered a critical system failure that erroneously reported the price of XRP worth $161 million. Fast forward to October 2023, and nature struck again. XRP’s price jumped over $50 on the same platform because of a comparable error. These mistakes led to confusion and opened a can of worms over the reliability of cryptocurrency data aggregators.
Traders use these platforms for frequent price scans and even small price misstatements can help drive traders down the wrong path. The CoinMarketCap blunders underscore just how difficult it is to keep data accurate in the rapid fire, easily manipulated, and often murky cryptocurrency market.
MEXC Exchange and Participant's Video
In July 2024, XRP exploded at the time on the MEXC exchange. It rocketed up a stunning 228% in under a minute, hitting $2 briefly before pulling back. One crypto investor, calling himself Participant, recorded a video of XRP blasting to $5,791. It later revised up to $579, but in short order jumped back up to $5,791 once more. These cases, though occasionally, highlight the extreme volatility and risk of error possible within the nascent cryptocurrency marketplace.
Extreme price swings might happen because of a programming error or just business conditions. It underscores the need for caution and diligent research before trading cryptocurrencies. Investors need to understand the downside risks of going all-in on individual data points.
