XRP has spent the better part of three months largely stuck in place while Bitcoin (BTC) climbed from roughly $60,000 to $80,000, and one chart analyst says the difference between expectation and reality has never been more obvious.
According to the analyst, community optimism has outpaced actual market performance for XRP by a wide margin.
XRP Has Been Losing Ground to Bitcoin Since 2017
UK-based technical analyst ChartNerd laid out the situation plainly in a post on Monday:
“I’m sorry to break this to my $XRP community. I’m just tired of the constant hopium: we have been underperforming Bitcoin since 2017, with NO signs of any major rotation. In fact, over the last 3 months, BTC has climbed 60K-80K while $XRP/BTC has lost its 20 MEMA.”
The 20-period exponential moving average on the XRP/BTC pair is a commonly used metric to track medium-term momentum of one asset relative to another. Falling below that level, as the chart shows, pushes the pair back toward the lower end of its long-term range.
Historically, that lower zone is where XRP has produced its most dramatic outperformance versus Bitcoin, including a notable surge in November 2024. However, the analyst is careful not to treat that history as an immediate buy signal. The pattern needs confirmation, and at the moment the confirmed movement is a breakdown.
“While BTC has climbed 60-80K, $XRP has done nothing but trend sideways, all while the XRP/BTC pair is breaking down,” ChartNerd added in a follow-up post.
In an update on May 21, the analyst pointed out that the XRP/BTC pair had been declining for 15 consecutive weeks, which directly helps explain why XRP’s USD price has remained essentially flat over the same period.
“I expect $XRP will likely underperform against Bitcoin for the majority of the year,” he wrote.
Subdued Short-Term Outlook
The short-term outlook is similarly muted. At the time of writing, XRP is trading around $1.36, holding within a narrow 24-hour range of approximately $1.34 to $1.37.
ChartNerd identifies $1.30 as a key support level and anticipates resistance near $1.40 on any recovery attempt, calling that zone a potential support/resistance flip. His extended bearish scenario points to a decline toward the $0.90–$0.70 range if broader market conditions deteriorate further. He has also noted that XRP’s two-week regression band lower boundary currently sits near $1.00.
Meanwhile, Bitcoin trades around $77,000 after a volatile stretch that briefly pushed it to just above $74,000 last week. It has since rebounded on reports of progress in US–Iran peace talks, and Bitcoin’s dominance over the rest of the crypto market has stayed above 58%.
That elevated dominance helps explain some of the pressure on XRP and many altcoins: when Bitcoin absorbs the majority of capital flows, alternative cryptocurrencies commonly lag behind.