Ripple Releases 1 Billion XRP, How Many Are Left?

Enterprise blockchain firm Ripple has conducted yet another scheduled escrow release, according to on-chain sleuth Whale Alert. 

The total unlock was executed across three separate transactions. 

The largest transaction released 500 million XRP ($666.07 million). A second transaction released 400 million XRP ($532.86 million). A final transfer unlocked 100 million XRP (about $133.21 million).

The remaining escrow 

The XRP Ledger has a strict maximum supply of exactly 100 billion tokens. 

According to current Binance market data from early June 2026, roughly 61.85 billion tokens are currently circulating in the open market. 

As of now, Ripple has a locked escrow balance of roughly 38.15 billion XRP tokens. 

It should be noted that it is now immediately clear when Ripple’s XRP escrow will be finally emptied. 

The company re-escrows a substantial portion of the one billion tokens it unlocks every month. Only a fraction of the unlocked amount is typically retained. 

Can Ripple burn the remaining escrow? 

One of the burning questions is whether or not Ripple executives could simply burn the remaining escrow to drastically reduce the total supply. 

Ripple’s David Schwartz has confirmed that the company voluntarily returns whatever XRP it expects not to need, want, or use back into the escrow system. 

Returning these unused funds effectively adds another month to the back end of the existing escrow schedule.

Regarding the possibility of permanently destroying the reserves, Schwartz noted that if the goal is to ensure the locked tokens never enter circulation, the company could achieve this unilaterally. Furthermore, Schwartz added that Ripple could mimic the effect of selling an escrow by transferring control of the account that the escrow completes into.

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse has expressed openness to potentially burning the XRP tokens currently held in the company’s escrow. He explicitly stated, “I don’t rule anything out” regarding the destruction of the escrowed funds.

Schwartz has downplayed the idea that a massive XRP burn would guarantee price gains by comparing it to the tokenomics of Stellar (XLM). He recently pointed out that in November 2019, the Stellar Development Foundation burned 55 billion XLM tokens, which accounted for half of its entire total supply. Despite reducing the total supply by 50%, Schwartz emphasized that the event did not cause a noticeable deviation in Stellar’s price.