As is known, Ripple regularly unlocks 1 billion of its XRP through an escrow system on the first day of every month. Accordingly, on January 1, 2024, Ripple will unlock 1 billion XRP in three transactions of 100 million, 400 million, and 500 million XRP, totaling $620 million in value.
1.84% of Circulating Supply to Be Unlocked
Interestingly, the unlocking on the first day of the new year will correspond to 1.84% of the current circulating supply of 53.56 billion XRP and 2.17% of the remaining 45.87 billion XRP under Ripple’s control. This unlocking process will continue until May 2027.
Moreover, the unlocking process of three locks held in two closely monitored wallet addresses will be completed in the final moments of 2023. In particular, the lock of the wallet address labeled ‘Ripple (22)’ will be unlocked, releasing 500 million XRP locked in November 2019. Additionally, the locks on 100 million and 400 million XRP, respectively locked in December and November 2019 at the wallet address labeled ‘Ripple (23)’, will be unlocked. These two wallet addresses hold a total of 2 billion XRP to be released over the next two months until March 1, 2024.
Looking at the process operated by Ripple for the 1 billion XRP it unlocked at the beginning of this month, it is seen, as expected, that the lock on 1 billion XRP was unlocked in December. Ripple relocked a total of 800 million XRP (80% of the total unlocked XRP) into the escrow system, which will be completed in April and May 2027.
Significantly, despite only holding 200 million XRP, the company unlocked 310 million XRP worth $192 million from its main wallet address ‘Ripple 1’ in December. The sales took place in four transactions weekly, and all remaining XRP were sent back to the same wallet address. Ripple 1 returned 200 million XRP to its reserves in December. The payment protocol also conducted two transactions of 60 million XRP each on December 6 and 12, and one transaction of 120 million XRP on December 20. Finally, one last transaction of 70 million XRP was conducted on December 27.
Ripple’s Escrow System for XRP
Ripple’s escrow system was developed with the creation of XRP in 2012 with a total supply of 100 billion. The company distributed 20 billion of this supply to the coin’s creators and the core team. Ripple’s treasury controlled the remaining 80 billion XRP and promised to release these coins not all at once but in stages. In 2017, Ripple implemented a new system to ensure that XRP was released into the market in a more predictable and controllable manner.
This system uses escrow wallets and is built on a smart contract that makes XRP unusable without meeting certain conditions. Ripple’s condition is to unlock 1 billion XRP on the first day of each month for 55 months, but despite the release of 1 billion XRP each month, Ripple only spends or sells a portion of them. According to Ripple, the remaining coins are relocked into new escrow wallets for future releases. These recurring lockings cause the 55-month process set for all XRP to start entering circulation to be continually extended.
On the other hand, these sales are causing a significant rate of supply inflation on XRP because the unlocked coins are regularly entering circulation at the beginning of each month. In this regard, Ripple fundamentally has the power to directly affect the economic dynamics, future price, and value of its own coin.
