It’s a muted start to the day for Ripple’s XRP as it makes its way back up above the $1.15 mark after shedding more than 5% of its value since the previous session. At the time of writing, XRP/USD is trading at around $1.17.

The decline was driven by Bitcoin’s fall under the $50,000 mark, sparking a sell-off across the overall crypto market and causing XRP to lose some of its value as well. As the market leader among cryptocurrencies, price action in BTC is often the strongest driver of market sentiment in this space and tends to have a corresponding effect on other digital assets as well.

Meanwhile, the legal drama underway between Ripple and the SEC appears to be heating up, with the company’s senior executives calling out the agency on its use to ‘deliberative process privilege’ (DPP). Ripple’s legal team argues that the deposition of former SEC executive William Hinman and the documents the SEC is withholding from sharing could “fatally undermine the SEC’s allegations that the Individual Defendants acted recklessly in failing to recognize Ripple’s sales of XRP as an unregistered securities offering as at that time, securities law experts of Mr. Hinman’s stature (to say nothing of the full Commission) had not reached that conclusion themselves, despite looking into the issue.”

Even as the lawsuit provides considerable uncertainty on the outlook for Ripple’s XRP, a popular crypto trader and influencer has forecast an extremely bullish rally in the cryptocurrency. According to ‘Credible Crypto’, XRP’s price could surge to $20-$30, a gain of more than $2,300% if it can make its way past the current ATH levels soon.

Amid the rising interest among investors in DeFi, there is also some hope for XRP if Ripple follows through on its idea for the Federated Sidechains on the XRP Ledger. The proposal was first introduced by the company’s CTO in early June and while we have not heard much on this since then, the recent attention Cardano is garnering for its upcoming rollout of smart contracts has reignited interest in the concept among the crypto’s followers. An innovation is like this is sure to propel the rise in value of Ripple’s XRP in the future.

Key Levels to Watch

On the H4 price chart of XRP/USD, most of the smaller moving averages and the MACD are exhibiting a bearish bias. Although, the larger timeframe MAs – 100 SMA, 100 EMA, 200 SMA and 200 EMA, along with the momentum indicator point to some buying interest as well.

Ripple’s XRP sits under the pivot point at $1.20 at the moment and needs more buying interest to build up for a confirmation of a bullish mood. On the other hand, further weakness or selling pressure can drive the price lower to test the immediate resistance at $1.07.