Ripple’s Chief Technology Officer David Schwartz has affirmed holding XRP, asserting that he would push its price higher if it were possible. The confirmation came as part of a wider discussion within the XRP community, with Schwartz once again refuting claims of deliberately suppressing the price of the cross-border payments token.

XRP Cannot Be “Dirt Cheap”

David Schwartz’s response came after X users revisited a comment made by the Ripple executive back in 2017. At the time, Schwartz contended that the price of the XRP coin could not remain “dirt cheap”, thanks to its utility in international transactions.

He observed that if XRP were worth $1 per coin, a transaction worth $1 million would need 1 million XRP. But, if XRP soared to $1 million a coin, only 1 XRP would be required for the same transaction. The Ripple CTO stressed that higher prices make transactions more cost-efficient.

One crypto community member observed that XRP is still “dirt cheap” seven years later at its current price of $0.594. Responding, Schwartz noted that $1 million worth of XRP still costs $1 million, suggesting that making a $1 million payment with XRP will cost $1 million. In simple terms, the total cost of payments is tied to the amount being transacted, regardless of the fluctuations in XRP’s price.

Ripple’s Schwartz Is An XRP Holder

In the same conversation, another XRP member rekindled the allegation that Ripple may be purposely keeping the price of XRP low, despite the company’s executives repeatedly dismissing the claims over the years. The user going by the online alias Marcelo Wolfarth urged Ripple to stop suppressing the price.

Ripple, being the biggest holder of XRP, is known for unlocking 1 billion XRP from escrow accounts at the beginning of every month. These periodic sales have been pinpointed as the reason for XRP’s relatively stagnant price action.

Schwartz again dismissed these claims, reiterating that he personally owns XRP. In fact, if he actually could propel the price of the Ripple-promoted crypto higher, he would definitely do it.

It’s unclear exactly how many XRP tokens the CTO currently holds, but he revealed earlier that he owned at least 26 million XRP at the peak of his holdings. Moreover, he indicated at the time that he had never sold any of his XRP and used the proceeds to acquire other cryptocurrencies, signifying his strong conviction in the coin’s future value.

A valuable Bitcoin metric has dropped to levels that historically signaled buying opportunities.

The Bitcoin Puell Multiple is a metric traders use to gauge a potential market top or bottom based on miner profitability. It works by weighing Bitcoin’s daily insurance in USD against the asset’s 365-day moving average.

According to a CryptoQuant report, the metric has dropped to the 0.4 range for the first time since the end of 2022.

The technical chart shows that the Puell Multiple, represented by the blue line, notably dropped to a lower bound (0.4), signaling a market bottom and strong buying opportunities.

The new development could signal to long-term investors in the accumulation phase that a market bottom is underway. According to CryptoQuant’s analyst, it could also mean that Bitcoin is still undervalued.

The analyst stated the importance of combining the Puell Multiple with other notable metrics, such as the on-chain data. Additionally, the analyst advised that considering macroeconomic conditions could be beneficial.

Bitcoin poised to reclaim $60,000

Another notably bullish development suggests that Bitcoin investors are playing the long game. Data from CryptoQuant revealed that Bitcoin exchange depositing addresses are at their lowest levels since 2016.

The current number of Bitcoin exchange depositing addresses has dropped to 132,100. The metric highlights the number of addresses sending inflow transactions to cryptocurrency exchanges.

Cryptoquant deduces that a reduction in value represents a decline in the number of investors selling coins on cryptocurrency spot exchanges, suggesting a drop in selling pressure.

At report time, Bitcoin is trading at $62,816. The apex cryptocurrency has lost 0.63% of its market value over the past 24 hours. Despite failing to sustain momentum above the $60,000 price level, Bitcoin has retained gains, going higher than 6% within seven days. The overall cryptocurrency market cap is notably down by 2.35%.

Crypto analyst Ali Charts took to X to highlight a rather optimistic outlook, stating that the asset can retest previous resistance levels and attempt an upclimb above $60,000.

“On the hourly chart, Bitcoin is moving within a parallel channel. If the lower boundary holds, BTC could rebound to the mid or upper levels at $60,200 or $62,000. However, a break below the $58,100 support may lead to a drop towards $55,000.” Ali Charts wrote.