Astronomical $500 Million XRP Changes Unknown Hands

A large XRP transfer has appeared on-chain with no direct explanation, involving 214,148,716 tokens valued at just under $500 million, as per WhaleAlert. The transaction moved the entire amount in one shot, from a long-active wallet to a newly activated address, both previously unattributed. No labels, alerts or announcements were issued surrounding the transfer.

The destination wallet was set up in June 2025 and had not been used much before. After the transfer, the balance is now 708 million XRP, making it one of the biggest holders on the ledger. The sending address still has a balance above one billion XRP, so it looks like they have control over a large share of the circulating supply.

At first, both wallets looked anonymous, with no public exchange or institutional attribution. The Ledger metadata did not give us any immediate clues. But after looking in more detail, it turns out that both addresses are linked to Uphold, a centralized platform that has a lot of XRP in reserve

The sender wallet matches a previously identified Uphold reserve address that has been around since 2021. The receiving address is newer, but it looks like it is part of the same internal infrastructure because it displays similar custodial patterns.

There was not any noticeable effect on XRP markets at the time of the transfer. Prices remained steady, and volumes did not change much. The move seems to be internal, controlled and kept low-key.

The way the transfer is set up suggests it is for cold storage, getting ready for liquidity or custodial rebalancing. Without public confirmation, the purpose is still up in the air. Blockchain data confirms the transaction was executed, but the intent and future use of the funds are still a secret.