XRP Slides to $1.03 as CLARITY Act Vote Slips to September Recess

XRP traded near $1.03 on Friday, down about 2.2% on the day and 5.7% on the week, after the US Senate confirmed it will not vote on the CLARITY Act before its August recess. The delay strips out the near-term regulatory catalyst that traders had priced in through July, and it lands on top of a spot ETF market that has already gone quiet. XRP’s market capitalisation sat around $64.2 billion, with 24-hour trading volume near $1.44 billion.

Senate Sets Aside CLARITY Act Vote Until After September Recess

Senate Majority Leader John Thune confirmed late Thursday that the chamber will not hold a floor vote on the CLARITY Act before lawmakers leave Washington, according to a CoinDesk report published on 6 August. The Senate breaks for recess on 10 August and returns on 14 September.

Procedurally, if Thune files for cloture before the recess, the first vote on the bill can happen as soon as Tuesday, 15 September. If he waits until senators return, the first procedural vote cannot land before Wednesday, 16 September.

The CLARITY Act is the market structure bill that would classify XRP as a commodity under federal law and hand primary oversight to the CFTC rather than the SEC. That reclassification was the piece of legislation institutional investors had been waiting on before treating XRP as a fully cleared spot allocation in their models.

Spot XRP ETFs Collect Just $27 Million in July

The regulatory pause meets an already weakening bid. Spot XRP ETFs recorded zero flows on 11 of July’s 22 trading days and pulled in just $27.29 million across the entire month, according to data reported by Coinspeaker. That is roughly 96% below the $666 million the same vehicles gathered in their first month of trading in November 2025.

For context, a spot ETF is a fund that holds the underlying asset directly and trades on a stock exchange, so its flows are a reasonable proxy for how much fresh institutional money is entering the market. When flows go to zero for half the trading days in a month, it means the buyers that anchored the price coming out of Q1 have stepped away. Analysts had assumed sustained ETF demand would keep XRP pinned above $1.20 through the summer, and that anchor has slipped.

You can watch how these shifts feed into daily crypto prices across the majors and how the altcoin bid rotates with them.

Whales Move 72% of Outflows as Spot Demand Weakens

On-chain data adds to the picture. On 3 August, whale addresses accounted for 81% of XRP outflows on Binance and 72% of outflows across centralised exchanges globally, according to CryptoQuant analyst Amr Taha, whose readings were cited in a crypto.news market update on 7 August.

Spot cumulative volume delta, a measure that tracks the net difference between market buys and market sells, fell more than 52% over the same window, dropping from about $235 million to $112 million. In plain terms, the biggest holders are the ones sending coins to exchanges (a common precursor to selling), and there are fewer aggressive spot buyers stepping in to absorb them.

Exchange holdings of XRP sit at roughly 1.6 billion tokens, the lowest level in seven years, which under normal conditions would tighten supply as coins move from spot venues into a self-custody crypto wallet. This week’s whale rotation runs in the other direction, sending tokens back onto trading platforms.

Short Bets Build on Binance as Open Interest Climbs 8%

The derivatives side is leaning bearish. Binance XRP open interest, which measures the total value of outstanding futures contracts on the exchange, rose from about $180 million on 4 August to $195 million on 7 August, an increase of roughly 8% in three days. Rising open interest on its own is neutral, but when it happens on a falling price, it typically signals fresh short positions being opened.

The perpetual cumulative volume delta on Binance moved from negative $292 million on 4 August to negative $363 million on 7 August, according to the same crypto.news reading. That is a clear read on aggressive selling into the down move rather than passive drift. Traders following the latest crypto news will note that this bearish futures build is happening while spot buyers are pulling back, a combination that has historically preceded further downside.

Traders Watch $1.00 Support and a 14-Day Senate Window

Technically, $1.00 has functioned as the only demand zone bulls have successfully defended across the entire calendar year. Resistance sits between $1.18 and $1.20, with the 50-day simple moving average at about $1.21. XRP entered August at $1.06, already down roughly 43% from its January high of $2.41.

Approximately 60% of XRP’s circulating supply is held at a loss on-chain, which historically produces two-sided flow around round-number support: forced sellers who want out at breakeven, and accumulation from holders who see the level as a floor.

The September Senate calendar is thin. There are only 14 working days when the chamber is in session across September and October, and the CLARITY Act will compete for floor time with appropriations fights ahead of the November midterms.

Why the CLARITY Delay Reshapes XRP’s Path Into Year-End

The XRP setup heading into the autumn is a two-part problem. The first part is structural: the ETF bid that was supposed to be a permanent floor for institutional flows has thinned to a trickle, and that decay predates this week’s Senate news. The second part is political: the CLARITY Act was the specific piece of law that would have unlocked the next wave of allocators, and its timeline has now slipped into a session where floor time is scarce.

The two problems interact. Without CLARITY, the largest asset managers face the same legal ambiguity that has capped XRP ETF issuance since launch. Without stronger ETF flows, XRP loses the market-making support holding other majors closer to their highs. The next six weeks are less about price technicals and more about whether the CLARITY Act clears its first cloture vote when senators walk back into the chamber on 14 September. If it does, XRP has a fresh catalyst. If it does not, the token is likely to spend the autumn re-testing whether $1.00 holds as a floor or breaks as one.