XRP has gained 9% this week amidst favorable crypto market conditions and rising institutional demand, including new ETF developments.
With XRP currently sitting at $2.3 and showing strong bullish momentum, could it reach $5 this May?
Analyst Predicts $100B XRP ETF Inflows
ProShares’ futures XRP ETF approval has sparked increased optimism that spot ETF approvals will follow, and one analyst believes they could generate substantial inflows.
Armando Pantoja forecasts that the spot XRP ETFs could attract $100 billion in inflows, which would undoubtedly prove crucial to the asset’s price performance.
Meanwhile, analyst John Squire said that the futures ETF approval ”increases XRP’s legitimacy,” but the “silver bullet” will come when the spot ETFs gain approval.
While futures ETFs allow traders to speculate on an asset’s performance, spot ETFs provide investors with direct asset exposure, meaning buying pressure positively impacts the asset’s price.
According to Squire, the institutional buying pressure from spot XRP ETFs will create “real market impact,” contributing to an XRP rally.
Grayscale’s spot XRP ETF has a critical deadline of 22 May, meaning that investors will soon have more certainty about approvals.
XRP Price Breaks Downtrend Resistance
After an explosive rally in Q4 of 2024, XRP faced strong resistance in the opening months of 2025. However, analysts have noticed a trend shift, which could signify that the next leg higher is imminent.
Chimp of the North highlighted that XRP recently broke above a trendline resistance level and flipped it to support. The analyst called this “the retest of a lifetime,” nodding to an explosive uptrend continuation in the coming months.
As to how far it could go, World of Charts believes XRP could surpass $5 by mid-summer.
Given the increasing likelihood of spot ETF approvals and the substantial demand analysts expect to see, this $5 target appears well within reach.
All of this comes at a time when the broader crypto market is shifting bullish, with numerous major altcoins giving big gains this month. But can some of these altcoins outperform XRP as prices continue to rise?
These Trending Altcoins Primed For Strong Gains in 2025
While XRP’s outlook is exciting, its major drawdown is that it already has a huge market cap. Currently, it’s worth a staggering $136 billion, which is more than every other cryptocurrency except Bitcoin and Ethereum.
In contrast, Solaxy is a promising new blockchain that has raised $32 million so far and aims to reshape the Solana ecosystem. It’s building the first-ever Solana layer 2 blockchain, aiming to boost speeds and cut fees compared to the main network.
This will unlock new use cases for the ecosystem that were otherwise unfeasible due to fees and transactional capabilities.
It’s also worth noting that Solaxy is the largest Solana presale in history, which massively strengthens its potential to explode once it hits the open market.
Virtuals Protocol is another project that’s on fire right now. It’s an AI agent launchpad that allows users to create agents with text-based prompts. Some of the agents built on Virtuals Protocol are also soaring. For instance, aiXCB is up 67% today, and VaderAI is up 23%.
Meanwhile, the $VIRTUALS token itself has booked a whopping 158% gain this week, reflecting deep market interest.
AI agents are one of the most viral technological breakthroughs to emerge in recent years, and Virtuals Protocol is leading the agentic crypto space. This is why it could be another project that generates strong gains.
Lastly, Deepbook Protocol is also among the top crypto performers this week, with a 144% gain. It’s a decentralized exchange built on layer 1 blockchain Sui, and it strongly focuses on ensuring deep liquidity.
Strong liquidity allows more sophisticated traders to use the network without creating price impact, which could attract more value to the ecosystem.
Sui has been on fire this week after Canary Capital filed for a staking ETF. If approved, this will make Sui one of the only cryptos with a live staking product.
Should Sui continue rallying, then Deepbook Protocol could prove a smart way to generate beta exposure and yield bigger returns.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not provide financial advice. Cryptocurrencies are highly volatile, and the market can be unpredictable. Always perform thorough research before making any cryptocurrency-related decisions.