Macro analyst Jim Willie is known for putting forward some of the most radical views in the XRP community. Recently, he proposed a set of macro arguments regarding XRP that go far beyond cryptocurrencies themselves. In a recent interview, he believes that a crisis is about to hit the government bond market, which will drive countries away from U.S. Treasury bonds and towards using XRP for trade settlements. He has projected prices as high as several thousand dollars per token.

These claims are quite broad in scope, and no supporting evidence is provided. Below are his views, as well as what is missing.

The core argument of Willie is that the world is heading towards a credit market crisis, with the focus on fixed-income and government bond markets.

He linked this judgment to the conflicts involving Iran, stating that these conflicts have made relations between countries that still need to engage in trade even more tense. In his view, these countries are not willing to use U.S. Treasury bonds for settlement, as the United States has been printing money continuously.

“We don’t want your government bonds because you’re printing money,” said Willie, stating that this is the stance he expects trade partners to take. He described this as a form of currency devaluation and noted that it opens the door for a neutral settlement asset.

XRP as a "bridge"

Willie indicates that XRP will undertake this role. He mentioned the cooperation between Ripple and Flare in terms of smart contracts and DeFi, and claimed that DTCC and Citadel are currently collaborating with Ripple. Derivative contracts will be settled using XRP.

“That can’t happen at prices of $20, $30, $50, or $80,” he said. “The currency of bankers is the bridge.” He also predicted that XRP would experience what he called a “Jet Magnificent” style launch, and linked it to the settlement of derivatives with DTCC.

"Reserve price" ranging from $5,000 to $12,000

The most notable claim is that the price of XRP has already been determined. In his Black Swan Capitalist podcast, he mentioned that a group of powerful institutions reached an agreement on this matter many years ago.

He named including IMF, central banks of various countries, custodian and trust companies that cooperate with BNY Mellon, NASDAQ, SWIFT, as well as large Wall Street banks. He said they agreed that "it would initially be 5,000 dollars, and it could eventually be 12,000 dollars," and mentioned that the SEC's lawsuit against Ripple is being used to limit public holdings.

In other interviews, he also mentioned the $1,000 XRP, as well as taking the first step towards a “three-digit” price.

BlackRock Theory

Willie also indicates that he believes XRP was once a "skunk work" within BlackRock, which is a secret project developed internally by the company about ten years ago.

The video that outlines his views also includes a segment of BlackRock CEO Larry Fink. When asked whether BlackRock would launch XRP ETF, Fink replied, "I cannot." Supporters interpret this as an implication. However, it could also simply be a normal response from the CEO who is unwilling to discuss products that have not yet been announced.

What do the numbers indicate?

On Thursday, the trading price of XRP was close to $1.34, with approximately 63 billion tokens in circulation.

• Calculated at $80 per unit: The market value of XRP is approximately 5 trillion US dollars.
• Calculated at $1,000 each: it amounts to approximately 63 trillion trillion dollars.
• Calculated at $5,000 each, that amounts to approximately 315 trillion trillion dollars, which is about three times the global annual economic output.
• Calculated at $12,000 per unit: it amounts to approximately 756 trillion trillion dollars.

Settlement assets do not require a very high price to transfer large amounts of funds, as the same batch of tokens can be reused repeatedly. Willie has not responded to this point. However, his statement has not yet been confirmed.

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