XRP briefly surged to $100 on South Korea's top exchange Upbit on July 23, sending shockwaves through the crypto community. The unusual price candle quickly went viral, with a tweet from analyst Steph is Crypto drawing nearly 700,000 views. “XRP just printed a $100 candle on Upbit. WTF is going on???” Steph wrote.
The token had been trading below $2 before the spike, making the deviation even more startling. Traders and analysts are split over whether the move reflects real buying pressure or a glitch in the exchange’s order book.
Community Reactions: From Shock to Skepticism
Crypto analytics platform Incite AI weighed in, stating: “No, that $100 XRP print on Upbit was almost surely a bad tick or a thin‑liquidity spike on one order book, not a real market move.” Trader Nomad Fulcrum echoed the sentiment, noting that such prints on Upbit often signal a “local orderbook vacuum” rather than fundamental shifts.
But a user calling themselves OurTimeIsNOWXRPL shared a personal experience, claiming his Xaman wallet showed a value of $100,000 the day before the spike. “It was crazy,” he said, adding a layer of intrigue to the event.
Historical patterns also drew attention. Trader Jacob Vatner pointed out: “The last time this happened down, we went down for 50 days; the last time this happened up towards the end of the year, we went up drastically at the turn of the new year.” While Vatner admitted the $100 candle was likely a glitch, he noted that past anomalies were followed by moves in the same direction — glitched or not.
Exchange Silent, Speculation Grow
Upbit has not issued any official explanation for the price spike. Market chatter focuses on two possibilities: high-slippage trades due to shallow order-book depth, or a data feed error that briefly misrepresented the price. Korean exchanges are known for thinner liquidity in certain pairs, making extreme quotes more likely.
Despite the lack of clarity, the XRP community is buzzing. Some traders are betting on a repeat of history by going long, while others stay cautious, dismissing the move as noise. The $100 “ghost candle” has once again highlighted the double-edged nature of low-liquidity trading pairs: small orders can cause outsized swings, yet also create arbitrage opportunities. Whether anyone actually profited from the anomaly — and whether the record will be revised — remains unknown.