TL;DR

Ripple (XRP) hit $1.40, boosted by news of SEC Chair Gensler’s upcoming resignation, sparking hopes for a more crypto-friendly regulator. The Shiba Inu team warns against scammers targeting its community with fake tokens and services. Bitcoin (BTC) climbs toward $100K, driven by Trump’s pro-crypto stance, with analysts eyeing further highs.

XRP Leads the Altcoin Parade

The past 24 hours have been quite eventful for the cryptocurrency market, with Bitcoin (BTC) rising to a new all-time high of almost $100,000 after a 2% daily price increase. Some of the altcoins have performed even better. Cardano (ADA), Solana (SOL), and more charted double-digit gains, but it was XRP that stole the show.

Ripples native token exploded to a three-year high of over $1.40, while its market capitalization briefly crossed $80 billion. The major resurgence followed the news that Gary Gensler will step down as Chairman of the US SEC on January 20, 2025.

XRP Price, Source: CoinGecko During his tenure, the Commission filed countless lawsuits against crypto businesses. Among the most popular is the lengthy legal battle against Ripple. 

Genslers departure was expected since the now-elect President of the US, Donald Trump, promised to fire him on day 1 after assuming office. The community hopes that the next Chairman of the securities regulator will be more open to innovation and less likely to hamper the crypto sectors advancement with constant lawsuits. The indications are that the successor could indeed be kind to the industry. 

However, nothing official has been announced yet, and it will be interesting to see how XRP performs once the next SEC Chairman is appointed. 

The Recent Warning to SHIB Users

Shiba Inu made the headlines after another warning was issued by the team. Earlier this week, Shibarium Trustwatch (an X account dedicated to exposing scams in the ecosystem and protecting users) alerted that scammers use Shytoshi Kusamas name (the lead developer of the meme coin project) to promote fraudulent tokens in fake groups.

Prior to that, the team warned users to stay away from dubious individuals who offer services with the meme coins SHI and TREAT, reminding that they are not live yet. 

Shiba Inu has one of the biggest and most devoted communities, which explains why bad actors often target members. 

Hows BTC Doing?

As mentioned above, the primary cryptocurrency is inching closer to the psychological level of $100,000. It is up almost 50% on a monthly scale, with its massive resurgence fueled by the election of Donald Trump as Americas 47th President. 

During his campaign, he promised to let the cryptocurrency industry thrive and even hinted at establishing a national strategic BTC reserve. We have yet to see whether he will stick to his promises and whether the leading digital asset will continue flying high throughout his rule. 

Meanwhile, many analysts believe that the price has no intention of stopping at the $100K mark. X user Mags envisioned a cycle peak at around $300,000, while Yoddha predicted a more mild increase to as high as $170,000. The latter, though, assumed that BTC might first pass through a consolidation phase before taking to the sky again. 

Those curious to check additional optimistic price predictions, feel free to take a look at our dedicated video below: