XRP derivatives traders suffered major losses on January 19 due to a sudden downturn in the cryptocurrency market, linked to renewed trade tensions between the U.S. and EU caused by President Donald Trump’s tariff threats regarding Greenland.

The rapid selloff resulted in over $5 million in XRP long liquidations, with Binance being responsible for more than $1 million lost, as leveraged positions were quickly exited amidst a broader retreat in digital assets.

XRP Liquidations Triggered by Tariff News

Data shared by market analyst Amr Taha on January 18 indicated that XRP experienced a significant long liquidation event, with total liquidations exceeding $5 million amid fears stemming from economic news over the weekend.

This selloff followed a Financial Times report suggesting that European nations were contemplating tariffs amounting to €93 billion (approximately $108 billion) on U.S. goods, potentially in response to Trump’s warnings to NATO allies about Greenland, and just days after he announced new tariffs on several European countries including Denmark, Germany, and France, effective from February 1.

The cryptocurrency market reacted quickly, with Bitcoin dropping from above $95,000 to below $93,000 in a matter of hours. The Kobeissi Letter reported that around $500 million in leveraged long positions were liquidated in roughly an hour, while another trader highlighted over $871 million in total liquidations across the market within a 24-hour frame.

XRP’s decline followed a general market downturn, exacerbating the losses for traders leveraging their positions amid heightened volatility across exchanges.

Current XRP Pricing

At the time of writing, XRP was priced approximately $2.00, reflecting a 5% decrease over the previous 24 hours, per CoinGecko data.

Despite recent strength in XRP exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that recorded net inflows of about $57 million last week, restarting after earlier outflows this month, demand for ETFs hasn’t translated into lasting price stability, which keeps XRP susceptible to downturns prompted by broad economic disputes.

Technical analysts had already noted weakening momentum before this liquidation event, warning that macroeconomic news outweighed the positive indicators specific to cryptocurrency.