XRP Short Traders Log Highest Losses in 2023 After Landmark Court Ruling

A landmark court ruling drove XRP prices to nearly double in the past 24 hours before receding during the early Asian trading hours on Friday, with XRP shorts losing the most money so far this year.

Data from Coinglass shows XRP-tracked futures traders racked up a total of $58 million in losses as a U.S. judge ruled the sale of XRP tokens on exchanges did not constitute investment contracts.

Of that, shorts, or bets against price rises, lost $33 million while longs constituted the remaining. Traders at crypto exchange Bybit saw the most liquidations at $21 million, followed by OKX at $14 million and Binance at $14 million.

Liquidation refers to when an exchange forcefully closes a trader’s leveraged position due to a partial or total loss of the trader’s initial margin. This happens when a trader is unable to meet the margin requirements for a leveraged position or fails to have sufficient funds to keep the trade open.

Large liquidations can signal the local top or bottom of a price move, which may allow traders to position themselves accordingly.

Such price action came immediately after the District Court for the Southern District of New York said the “offer and sale of XRP on digital asset exchanges did not amount to offers and sales of investment contracts,” as “the record cannot establish the third Howey prong to these transactions.”

Elsewhere, the ruling caused Solana (SOL), Cardano (ADA) and other altcoins to jump as traders likely considered XRP’s partial victory as a favorable outcome for the crypto market – one that has been targeted by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in recent months for allegations of several issuers offering their tokens as securities to U.S. investors.