Should You Buy XRP While It's Under $2.50?

XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) has been soaring over the last year. The cryptocurrency at the heart of the RippleNet international payment service nearly quadrupled in the last two months of 2024, boosted by the presidential election results and the end of a burdensome lawsuit. The coin jumped from $0.50 to $2.70 and rose even higher in 2025.

Having visited an all-time high of $3.56 in July, XRP backed down to $2.20 as of Nov. 6. Is it time to load up on this promising cryptocurrency while it's trading below $2.50?

Image source: Getty Images.

Let's cut to the chase

In a word, the answer is no.

XRP may have retreated from even loftier prices, but it remains incredibly overpriced today.

If you look at RippleNet as a business operation, that service managed about $57.7 billion of total payment volume (TPV) in the quarter ending on Sept. 30, 2025. That's impressive, but let's put the numbers in context.

Fellow digital payment specialist PayPal (NASDAQ: PYPL) handled $458.1 billion of TPV in the same period. It's unclear how much money the Ripple group made from these transactions, but RippleNet is known for its low fees and quick transactions. It's safe to say that XRP generated far less revenue than PayPal's $8.4 billion. Yet, Ripple's valuation based on early funding rounds is comparable to PayPal's, and XRP's market value is more than three times as large.

XRP isn't digital gold

You could argue that XRP is worth what buyers think it's worth and nothing else. The same line of thinking may apply to every cryptocurrency, not to mention gold or real estate. XRP's current price might make sense from this point of view, but it's a flimsy argument.

The other assets I mentioned are useful or at least desirable things. Their exact prices are set by semi-random market forces, but in a range defined by supply and demand. There's only so much gold in the world, and plots of land can be incredibly valuable in heavily developed business centers like New York City, Paris, or Singapore.

And Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) mimics the valuation calculus of gold with a strict supply side limit and very expensive mining operations. Gold miners invest time and money in finding and refining physical gold; Bitcoin miners invest in number-crunching hardware and massive electric bills to make new digital coins.

But you can't mine XRP. Ripple created 100 billion coins at the launch in 2014 and keeps about 40 billion locked away in reserve accounts. The circulating volume is under Ripple's direct control, including the option to add more coins without warning. This cryptocurrency wasn't designed for wealth management. Instead, it's acting like a meme coin these days.

Comparing XRP to Goldman Sachs is a stretch

Long story short, XRP is almost certainly not worth $134 billion today -- but that's the market cap, based on its circulating coins. If you look at the full 100-billion coin list instead, the fully diluted market value soars to $220 billion. That's right behind Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) and just a few billion below payment giant American Express (NYSE: AXP). Does XRP really belong in that conversation yet?

Again, the answer is no. It may earn that market position someday -- many years from now. At this point, it takes a lot of speculation and ignoring plenty of market risks to arrive at this enormous valuation.

So I'm not buying XRP these days. And $2.50 or $2.20 are not the buy-in windows I'm looking for.

It wasn't even super cheap before the 2024 elections. I'm still keeping an eye on RippleNet's place in the global economy, hoping for breakthroughs in payment volumes, banking partnerships, or regulatory clarity. Fingers crossed and all that, but not much is happening at the moment. Payment volumes aren't soaring, the number of XRP accounts is holding steady, and Ripple isn't exactly swimming in new partnerships.

And the coin is still soaring at unreasonable heights.

American Express is an advertising partner of Motley Fool Money. Anders Bylund has positions in Bitcoin and XRP. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Bitcoin, Goldman Sachs Group, PayPal, and XRP. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2027 $42.50 calls on PayPal and short December 2025 $75 calls on PayPal. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.