“This was said to be used to look up ex-lovers, check where their significant others were riding and to stalk people they found attractive who shared a Lyft Line with them... One staffer apparently bragged about obtaining Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s phone number.”
My theory to explain the price surge is that cryptotraders are looking for non-correlation against Bitcoin which is currently trading at such a high value that it is making a lot of people nervous. Ripple is the largest coin that didn’t participate in the rapid marketcap gains that the BTC bullmarket pulled ethereum, litecoin, etc into. A lot of traders hear ‘centralized blockchain’ and think that makes it a good hedge against bitcoin’s distributed nature - doesn’t seem to be a lot of understanding about how these bank partnerships work or what an investment in an XRP token actually gets you.
XRP was 100% premined. How many percentage are still held be owners?
My bet would be that the tiny float is multiplying the value. Because of that market cap of XRP is artificially inflated.
XRP network is not really a cryptocurrency, if you ask me. It is not trustless, has counterparty risk, is censorable, not designed to be a commodity in itself, etc.
I was actually playing with Ripple before Bitcoin existed, and it was centralized website. I could see it having some application, but it is just no the same game as Bitcoin and other altcoins.
Bingo. I think the delusion will persist if Coinbase lists it which is and has been the current rumor in the trader circles I frequent. I'd lose a bit of respect for CB if they did but it will certainly make them a lot of money because $2.00 is so cheap!
As someone pointed out above, this deal seems to be modeled after DST’s 2009 tender offer for Facebook shares - they paid a 35% discount for common shares from employees and early investors. DST cashed out in the IPO making a return of around ~18x.
Right so nothing to see here...