How high can Ripple go?
Who knows? Ripple is up almost 30% in 24 hours.
Ether started out 2017 at $8.00… It closed the year at around $800.
Will Ripple end up like Ether in a year? Nothing surprises me about cryptocurrencies anymore. As such, it does not seem far fetched that in a year Ripple (XRP) could be up by 100x, at, say, $300 per XRP.1
At least Ripple has a business model, like Ethereum.
Ethereum (the platform for Ether) is similar to Ripple in the sense that there is an actual business model behind its cryptocurrency. Ether is a cryptocurrency that you can use to buy “gas” which powers smart contracts built on Ethereum.
A smart contract is basically an agreement to transfer a cryptocurrency from one party to another based on certain terms that need to be met (e.g. “I’ll give you 1 Bitcoin if you mow my lawn.”)
Since there is a limited amount of XRP, and Ripple has a B2B financial services business model behind it that seems to be working, it seems as though the hype around Ripple could be sustained until it matures.
Some very smart people have bet on Ripple… Marc Andreessen being one of them… As such, it could be among the least crazy cryptocurrency bets out there.
That said, there are bearish cases against Ripple, because of liquidity problems that argue more in favor of Bitcoin, Ether and Bitcoin Cash.
Unless you are a computer scientist cryptographer, it’s difficult to understand not only the technology, but also, more importantly, what the teams behind many of these cryptocurrencies aim to do to make money besides pumping up the cryptos.
Maybe we should all take Warren’s advice…
Footnotes
- It has helped Ether’s visibility that Ether can be traded on Coinbase, which is the most popular platform for trading cryptocurrencies in the U.S.