A new breakdown from TheCryptoBasic looks at where Ripple’s XRP price could trade if it becomes a key asset for settling global payroll.
XRP is sitting near $2.08 at writing, but the thread argues the token still doesn’t reflect what real adoption could mean for its long-term value. And when you look at the size of the payroll market, the numbers start to make more sense.
What you'll learn 👉
Why Payroll Matters for XRP
Payroll software alone is expected to generate nearly $28 billion next year and over $34 billion by 2030, but the real action is in the amount of money companies actually pay out to workers.
Global wages land somewhere between $40 trillion and $50 trillion every year. That’s an enormous payment flow that depends on fast, reliable settlement – something XRP was designed for.
TheCryptoBasic points out that even after thousands of percent in gains since its launch, XRP is still priced as if it won’t capture any major share of this system.
How Grok Modeled Potential XRP Prices
To paint a clearer picture, Grok AI built a simple model. It first looked at a scenario where XRP handles about a quarter of global payroll payments. That’s roughly $10 trillion to $12.5 trillion moving through the network each year.
If each token is used around 50 times annually, the market would need to value XRP somewhere between $250 billion and $500 billion. That’s already a big jump from where it is today.
The next scenario takes things further. If the XRP price ends up with 30% to 40% of global payroll – meaning $15 trillion to $20 trillion in yearly volume – Grok estimates a market value anywhere between $2 trillion and $14 trillion.
At the top of that range, each XRP would trade near $248. That’s why Grok’s final target in this model lands at $250 for 2030.
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Investors holding 1,000, 5,000, and 10,000 XRP tokens could see massive profit if the XRP price rallies in a scenario where XRP powers the global payroll industry.
— TheCryptoBasic (@thecryptobasic) December 8, 2025
XRP trades at $2.18 today with a market value of about $131.8 billion. However, analysts who have tracked the…
What That Means for Ripple XRP Holders
TheCryptoBasic then looked at how these numbers translate to real portfolios. More than 770,000 wallets hold between 1,000 and 10,000 XRP today.
At a $250 price, someone with 1,000 XRP would see a balance that’s worth about $2,200 right now turn into $250,000.
Someone holding 5,000 XRP would move from roughly $11,000 to $1.25 million. And a wallet with 10,000 XRP would jump from around $22,000 to $2.5 million. The gains look extreme, but they come straight from the model’s math.
However, this isn’t a prediction – it’s a way to show how large settlement markets can affect valuation if Ripple manages to secure meaningful adoption.
Payroll is one of the biggest payment systems on Earth, and many parts of it still run on slow and outdated rails. If Ripple’s XRP ever becomes a standard for handling even a fraction of that flow, the price levels in this model become realistic outcomes rather than speculation.
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