XRP News Today: XRP Holds $1.55 as Bitget Hack Tops $387M

XRP News Today: How Did the $387M Bitget Hack Hit XRP?

There's a lot happening in XRP News Today, and the price action alone tells a story worth digging into. 

XRP is trading at $1.55, up 1.99% over the past 24 hours, holding steady even as one of the year's biggest exchange hacks continues unfolding in the background, one that specifically drained over 100 million XRP from Bitget's wallets. 

Here's the full picture: where the price actually stands, what happened with the hack, and a look at one of the people who built the ledger XRP runs on in the first place.

XRP's Current Price Action

Here's exactly where things stand right now:

Note: Cryptocurrency prices can change rapidly. Price data may differ from the latest market value, so always verify the current price through an official or reliable market source before making any financial decision. This price data is based on the market conditions as of September 26, 2026, at 11:00 AM IST. 

Source: CoinMarketCap's live data 

The chart shows a genuinely wild ride over the past day; the price spiked sharply toward $1.62 before pulling back and stabilizing in the $1.55 to $1.56 range, still holding comfortably above where it opened near $1.53. 

Notably, this recovery is happening at the same time news of the Bitget breach has been spreading, which says something about how the broader market is digesting the situation so far.

What Actually Happened in the Bitget Hack

Per Bitget's own security updates, the exchange detected unauthorized transfers from portions of its hot and warm wallet infrastructure at 18:31 UTC on September 24, 2026. 

Cold wallet reserves remained secure throughout. CEO Gracy Chen said the incident was not the result of stolen private keys; attackers instead compromised a backend wallet system and fed it forged transfer data, which tricked Bitget's own authorization process into signing off on the payouts as if they were legitimate.

Source: Bitget on X

The scale of this breach has grown as investigators have dug deeper:

• Initial estimate on September 24: $351.6 million in stolen assets

• Revised estimate on September 25: $387.5 million, after tracing additional Zcash and TRON transfers that weren't captured in the first count

• Bitget has stressed the increase reflects better accounting of what already moved, not new unauthorized transfers

Why XRP Specifically Took the Biggest Single Hit

Among all the assets drained in this breach, XRP stands out as the largest single slice of the theft. 

Onchain trackers identified roughly 102.93 million XRP, worth close to $157 million at the time, as the biggest individual asset taken, ahead of the 31,890 ETH (about $86 million) that made up the next largest chunk. 

Source: X Post 

The affected assets overall span a wide range: XRP, ETH, USDT, ZEC, USDC, USDT0, XAUt, BNB, AVAX, and TRX moved across Ethereum and other EVM networks, XRP Ledger, the Zcash, and TRON.

Bitget has publicly shared the primary attacker-controlled receiving addresses identified so far, including one on the XRP Ledger (rwNhefsz1UQEusxhCvHip3RANinWi4CTck), to help exchanges and security researchers watch for further movement of the stolen funds.

Where Things Stand With Recovery and Withdrawals

Bitget has been fairly transparent with updates throughout this incident. Key points on where things currently stand:

• Withdrawals remain temporarily paused while security checks and remediation continue, though deposits and regular trading have stayed open

• A withdrawal restoration plan is set to be announced by September 26 at 4:00 AM UTC

• Bitget launched a Recovery Bounty Program offering 5% rewards to anyone who helps freeze or recover stolen funds

• The exchange's User Protection Fund, which held more than $464 million at the time of the incident, is covering the losses, though the revised $387.5 million figure narrows that cushion to roughly $76.5 million before any recovered funds are factored in

• Bitget is working with cybersecurity firms Mandiant and SlowMist, and some of the stolen assets have already been frozen through coordination with other exchanges and blockchain projects

Importantly, Bitget has stated the incident remains fully contained, with no further unauthorized transfers possible since it was shut down.

Getting to Know XRP's Original Architect

Amid all this, it's worth stepping back to remember who actually built the technology at the center of today's story. 

Source: BSCNews on X

David Schwartz, known online as JoelKatz, began building the XRP Ledger in early 2011 alongside Jed McCaleb, who later co-founded Stellar, and Arthur Britto. 

The three shared an appreciation for Bitcoin but saw mining as fundamentally wasteful, which shaped their approach to XRP's ledger design from the start.

A few key milestones in Schwartz's history with the project:

• The XRP Ledger went live in June 2012

• 80% of the total XRP supply went to a new company later renamed Ripple

• Schwartz became Ripple's chief cryptography officer, then rose to CTO in 2018

• He stepped back from daily duties at the end of 2025 and now sits on Ripple's board as CTO emeritus

• The XRPL's code has been open source since day one, with the non-profit XRPLF now supporting the ledger and its community

• In 2025, Schwartz said he was personally running his own XRPL node and exploring uses for XRP beyond Ripple's own business

Conclusion

This round of XRP News Today captures a token holding up reasonably well, up nearly 2% and trading near $1.55, even while absorbing news that it was the single largest asset stolen in a $387.5 million exchange breach. 

With Bitget's withdrawal plan expected imminently and recovery efforts actively underway through bounties and industry cooperation, how the market reacts once withdrawals resume will likely be the next real test for XRP's price stability. 

Meanwhile, the ledger itself, built more than a decade ago by architects like David Schwartz, continues operating independently of any single exchange's security troubles, a distinction worth remembering when incidents like this one make headlines.

Disclaimer

This article is for educational and informational purposes only and should not be considered financial or investment advice. Always conduct your own research before making investment decisions.