David Schwartz, former chief technology officer at Ripple and an early designer of the XRP Ledger, drew a line under claims that he is responsible for XRP’s weak price. He said he cannot claim to have no influence on XRP’s price, but that his actual influence is “very small.”

On Nov. 8, blockchain media outlet U.Today reported that Schwartz said this on X, formerly Twitter, in response to a user asking about the relationship between XRP’s price and him.

The dispute surfaced as community frustration grew over XRP’s weak price. One user pressed Schwartz, telling him not to dodge responsibility and asking whether he could say he had no impact at all on XRP’s price.

Schwartz said it was hard to say he was completely unrelated to XRP’s price, but stressed that his influence was “very small.”

XRP is reported to have fallen about 50 percent over the past year. Over the same period, Stellar (XLM), classified as a payments cryptocurrency, showed a similar price trend. This suggests it is difficult to explain XRP’s weakness based only on Schwartz’s statements or actions.

Schwartz also voiced complaints that hostile reactions toward him have been increasing. He said some users show up even in conversations on other topics, call him a scammer or raise XRP-related issues. He explained that such behavior disrupts conversations with other users and said he decided to block those accounts.

He stressed that this does not mean he will block criticism of XRP itself. Schwartz said “honest criticism” or accusations with reasonable grounds are not a problem. He said he could block users even if they mention XRP positively if they repeatedly do the same thing in places unrelated to the topic of the conversation.

He also suggested he could unblock users who promise not to repeat the same behavior. He said this is intended to distinguish criticism from attacks and to respect the context of conversations.

Attention has also focused on Schwartz’s current role at Ripple. He stepped back from day-to-day work at the end of 2025 but has not left the company entirely. He said earlier this month that he still participates on Ripple’s board and retains the honorary CTO title. He added that he also meets twice a month with a team he used to work with.

The controversy shows that as XRP’s price weakness continues, community frustration is being directed even at a symbolic figure at Ripple. Schwartz reiterated that he views his influence as limited and said he will distinguish between reasonable criticism about the price and repeated attacks in unrelated conversations.

@JoelKatz Don't run from this. Can you honestly say you have nothing to do with it? People's anger isn't baseless.