Ripple Former CTO Says XRP Could Flip Bitcoin Through an 18x Surge as XRPL Defends Bot Activity

XRP (XRP-USD) trades under $1.40 as former Ripple Chief Technology Officer David Schwartz outlined how the digital token could pass Bitcoin in market value. Speaking during a live online broadcast, David Schwartz stated that an 18-fold price increase for XRP is more plausible than a total drop in Bitcoin’s value.

Bitcoin sits near $78,000, while XRP carries a market cap of $87.25 billion. This puts XRP at about 5.5% of Bitcoin’s overall market size. For XRP to flip Bitcoin without Bitcoin moving, XRP would need to complete an eighteen-fold price surge.

Trading data shows XRP compressed in a tight daily price range between $1.375 and $1.40. XRP’s technical charts show resistance between $1.43 and $1.46, with key price support levels holding between $1.34 and $1.35. A clean break above $1.43 could open a path toward $1.50, while dropping below $1.32 risks a pullback to $1.20.

David Schwartz Defends the XRP Ledger against Ghost Chain Claims

While traders debate long-term price targets, the XRP Ledger faces scrutiny over how network activity is distributed. According to Bitquery research, 793 accounts handled 93.2% of all ledger transactions in August 2026. The report noted that human-scale payments made up less than 1% of traffic after filtering out automated bots and machine operations.

XRP critic Scam Daddy highlighted the study on social media, labeling the network a ghost chain due to the high volume of automated traffic. In response, David Schwartz rejected the criticism, arguing that low network fees are a key feature rather than a weakness. David Schwartz noted that cheap fees allow users to run all types of transactions, questioning whether higher fees would make the network better.

Pro-XRP lawyer Bill Morgan also defended the network, pointing out that calling the XRP Ledger a ghost chain relies on insults rather than measuring actual value moving across the blockchain. At the same time, network builders are voting on a new feature that lets big companies share tasks safely.

At the time of writing, XRP’s price is sitting at $1.3650.