XRP triggered $2.02 million worth of short-position liquidations in an hour, flipping an imbalance in derivatives markets.

On Sept. 15 local time, blockchain outlet U.Today reported that after holding a key support level, XRP turned heavy selling into rebound momentum, creating a short-term short squeeze.

Across the broader crypto market, total liquidations over the past 24 hours exceeded $386.09 million, affecting about 78,000 traders. The largest single order was worth $11.76 million on Binance’s ETH-USDT trading pair. The most unusual hourly move, however, appeared in the XRP derivatives market.

In that period, XRP short-position liquidations totalled $2.02 million. Long-position liquidations were $1.58 million in the same hour, and as forced liquidations on the sell side cascaded, the hourly liquidation imbalance widened to 851 percent. Short positions hit margin requirements and were closed at market prices, spurring a rise in prices.

The price response was immediate. Based on TradingView charts, XRP ran into a dense wall of limit buy orders in the $1.38 to $1.39 range. Buying then tripped stop-loss orders on short positions, lifting the price as high as a short-term peak of $1.44. The relative strength index (RSI) surged into overbought territory.

An attempt to push XRP into a low-liquidity zone failed. With insufficient selling to follow through, exchange algorithms executed market buy orders at higher prices. As a result, a structure formed in which bearish bets instead triggered additional buying.

The derivatives imbalance also coincided with a strong news flow in mid-September. The XRP Ledger network recorded 8.57 million unique addresses. As network activity indicators rose to record levels, it became possible to interpret that bearish positions had underestimated external variables.

Institutional fund flows also weighed on downside bets. Based on Sosovalue tallies, cumulative net inflows into XRP spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) came to $1.71 billion. The funds’ total net assets were $1.588 billion. The market viewed aggressive short positions as carrying high risk while steady institutional buying continued.

XRP showed a short-term trend of mounting pressure on short positions as support held, network indicators improved and spot ETF inflows overlapped. Going forward, the market is expected to watch whether derivatives liquidation dynamics and spot inflows continue around macro events.