Monero's peak value

[pawanjain]

This is interesting. I didn't notice this price surge in Monero until I read this post.
So from a high level search it shows that the recent pump is mostly due to privacy coins.
Also, some crypto hackers have converted the stolen funds into Monero which has also contributed to increase XMR price.
Good to see it breaking the ATH. I am personally waiting for BTC and SOL to break their ATH prices.

[crwth]

I'm seeing this as some people might be taking advantage of Monero's properties, especially its privacy features. Maybe there are some shady things going on and XMR is the way they transact. Mostly, it's like ZEC, which also went up in price.

I wish I were able to trade this 

[bated]

This is interesting. I didn't notice this price surge in Monero until I read this post.
So from a high level search it shows that the recent pump is mostly due to privacy coins.
Also, some crypto hackers have converted the stolen funds into Monero which has also contributed to increase XMR price.
Good to see it breaking the ATH. I am personally waiting for BTC and SOL to break their ATH prices.

Yeah, I read that someone was socially engineered into giving details about their hardware wallet which had $280 million in BTC.  The BTC was rapidly converted to XMR causing the pump which is why it is going to dump even further IMO.  I also think that it was a perfect storm with the CEO of Coinbase raising concerns about privacy at about the same time.

[shinratensei_]

I'm seeing this as some people might be taking advantage of Monero's properties, especially its privacy features. Maybe there are some shady things going on and XMR is the way they transact. Mostly, it's like ZEC, which also went up in price.

I wish I were able to trade this  

Heard that there are some hacker converting tens of millions to XMR at the time of pump and that can be the reason it pump in the first place.
Some people in X talking about this but I don't know if that's even true. XMR being taken advantage is not new. Every hacker always convert their money to XMR. The privacy feature is double edged sword.

[bitgolden]

As we have seen, other coins got green too, right after this. While some may have gone high, not many gone high as much as Monero did, so we can safely assume that Monero is still doing fine in the privacy coin world, but that's about it. It's a coin that is used by very small amount of people compared to other big names, and since it is not legal in many nations, there is really no need to trust this to keep going. I will not risk myself by using it or even trading it and I will avoid it as much as I can.

[OmegaStarScream]

Heard that there are some hacker converting tens of millions to XMR at the time of pump and that can be the reason it pump in the first place.
Some people in X talking about this but I don't know if that's even true. XMR being taken advantage is not new. Every hacker always convert their money to XMR. The privacy feature is double edged sword.

A hacker choosing XMR over ZEC  (for such a large sum) to hide his tracks sends a clear signal that XMR is superior to every other privacy coin out there, whether that's actually true or not.

So sure, the hacker pumped the price ... but that act alone (IMO) must've encouraged more people to trust XMR (as a privacy coin) and buy it and I think we can see it right now, with the price settling down a bit and the alts (along with BTC) bleeding, XMR is still holding.

[EarnOnVictor]

Take a look at this chart. XMR updated its historical ATH and surpassed the $700 mark.

OMG!!! I would have sold this market immediately. Unfortunately, time has passed and Monero has dropped significantly from this level. I often miss opportunities like this because of lack of follow-up, because all my exchanges do not offer XMR, which is disheartening.

As for the time the crypto market will slip into bearish mode, I think they've done that already, especially the altcoins. You should be feeling sorry for some of them by now.

However, gone are the days that all the crypto space at large would slip into to a major bearish trend, we will always see it the way we see it now, where some will buy and others will sell.

[fullfitlarry]

Heard that there are some hacker converting tens of millions to XMR at the time of pump and that can be the reason it pump in the first place.
Some people in X talking about this but I don't know if that's even true. XMR being taken advantage is not new. Every hacker always convert their money to XMR. The privacy feature is double edged sword.

A hacker choosing XMR over ZEC  (for such a large sum) to hide his tracks sends a clear signal that XMR is superior to every other privacy coin out there, whether that's actually true or not.

That could be the case for sure. They know that XMR is hard to trace and so their foot prints can be hide with his superior privacy coins as compare to others.

So sure, the hacker pumped the price ... but that act alone (IMO) must've encouraged more people to trust XMR (as a privacy coin) and buy it and I think we can see it right now, with the price settling down a bit and the alts (along with BTC) bleeding, XMR is still holding.

Perhaps the investors really chooses XMR to pump right now because of this use case. Maybe they are tired of those altcoins and meme coins that they supported XMR now and then see how it goes for them. So far so good and it could send a trend for XMR to have steady gains despite altcoin market is bleeding again.

[ultrloa]

Heard that there are some hacker converting tens of millions to XMR at the time of pump and that can be the reason it pump in the first place.
Some people in X talking about this but I don't know if that's even true. XMR being taken advantage is not new. Every hacker always convert their money to XMR. The privacy feature is double edged sword.

A hacker choosing XMR over ZEC  (for such a large sum) to hide his tracks sends a clear signal that XMR is superior to every other privacy coin out there, whether that's actually true or not.

So sure, the hacker pumped the price ... but that act alone (IMO) must've encouraged more people to trust XMR (as a privacy coin) and buy it and I think we can see it right now, with the price settling down a bit and the alts (along with BTC) bleeding, XMR is still holding.

Having that feature in default with XMR is I provably the main reason why hacker choose XMR. While in Zcash everything is optional, so it make sense for that criminals to choose XMR automatically if they like to hide their tracks.

That situation maybe the reason on why XMR reputation goes more bigger and prove that its better than any privacy coin out there. Seems people use XMR on more technical situation and that demand help XMR price to rise, while other options maybe dropping or didn't get much attention same as what XMR get.

[Knight Hider]

https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/01/16/hacker-steals-usd282-milion-in-hardware-wallet-social-engineering-attack

One article links Monero's peak value with 1,459 bitcoins hacking .

A 'hardware wallet social-engineering attack'? Ledger?

[Abiky]

Heard that there are some hacker converting tens of millions to XMR at the time of pump and that can be the reason it pump in the first place.
Some people in X talking about this but I don't know if that's even true. XMR being taken advantage is not new. Every hacker always convert their money to XMR. The privacy feature is double edged sword.

Does this mean a huge "dump" is bound to happen soon? Because increasing market prices are only a result of the "privacy coins hype". Not because people are seriously buying and using Monero for payments. This "hacker" you're talking about, can sell XMR on the market anytime causing it to "dump" in an instant. It would be better off if he keeps the XMR.

For what I know, Monero has inflation "baked" into the protocol. Sooner or later, market prices will crash. I mean, high prices for XMR are not sustainable over the long term. XMR is better suited as "digital cash" than a store of value. But that's just my opinion. I know some will differ. We'll see how far will XMR go.

[Emitdama]

Does this mean a huge "dump" is bound to happen soon? Because increasing market prices are only a result of the "privacy coins hype". Not because people are seriously buying and using Monero for payments. This "hacker" you're talking about, can sell XMR on the market anytime causing it to "dump" in an instant. It would be better off if he keeps the XMR.

For what I know, Monero has inflation "baked" into the protocol. Sooner or later, market prices will crash. I mean, high prices for XMR are not sustainable over the long term. XMR is better suited as "digital cash" than a store of value. But that's just my opinion. I know some will differ. We'll see how far will XMR go.

It already did basically. Roughly about a month ago, it was around 430 dollars, right now it is 514 dollars, so we can say that it has gone up a lot even though the trajectory is still down and you may still lose some money if you keep on holding. But, the crash happened in a way because from that 430 dollars or so level, it peaked at nearly 800 dollars, never reached 800 if I am not wrong but got very close to it. So from 430 to 800 to 514 shows you that it had a crash already.

[Alpen]

https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/01/16/hacker-steals-usd282-milion-in-hardware-wallet-social-engineering-attack

One article links Monero's peak value with 1,459 bitcoins hacking .

A 'hardware wallet social-engineering attack'? Ledger?

The "attack" on the Ledger wallet was actually a case of social engineering. The hacker used personal data from a previous company leak to trick the user into moving their funds to a "safe" wallet. Clearly, the user didn't realize that nothing is more secure than cold storage.

By the way, I ran that "safe" address through the Cryptomus AML scanner, and it’s flagged red. The victim could have easily avoided this by doing a quick check, but they were probably in too much of a rush to send the funds.

In an era full of scams, you absolutely have to verify every address before making any significant transfer.

[m2017]

Does this mean a huge "dump" is bound to happen soon? Because increasing market prices are only a result of the "privacy coins hype". Not because people are seriously buying and using Monero for payments. This "hacker" you're talking about, can sell XMR on the market anytime causing it to "dump" in an instant. It would be better off if he keeps the XMR.

The "dump" is already happening (after the established peaks), look at the price chart. It seems to me that the excitement here isn't due to the hype around privacy coins, as only XMR was pumped up (others, not so much). To use XMR for payments, you need "stores" that accept this currency. I don't see much variety in such stores. It seems to me that this hacker (or whoever) was selling their XMR, judging by the chart.

For what I know, Monero has inflation "baked" into the protocol. Sooner or later, market prices will crash. I mean, high prices for XMR are not sustainable over the long term. XMR is better suited as "digital cash" than a store of value. But that's just my opinion. I know some will differ. We'll see how far will XMR go.

If the price had remained stable at roughly the same level, it would have been unlikely to trigger a collapse due to inflation. Looking closely at the XMR price chart, it would have been naive to expect this "candlestick" to be stable. It would have inevitably led to a decline in value, which is exactly what we're seeing now. Those who had the foresight to sell their XMR at high levels deserve nothing but praise. Bravo.

[Antona]

What is your opinion about the increase in price of monero?

Privacy concerns raised by CEO of Coinbase ... and now we know why Monero is pumping!

I reckon it is going to plummet today after successful push back on the US crypto act as the privacy concerns subside.

Its mostly pressure from regulators and changes of rules, which i understand also. I do believe XMR will go far they way its going.

[wiss19]

Considering the drop it had so far, we can safely say that there was a moment some whale entered and that was probably it. With the low liquidity it has because of the exchanges it got blocked and delisted, monero isn't listed everywhere and that makes it a very low liquidity project and when someone rich enters, that makes it go up a lot, but since they do not keep putting in more and more money all the time, people slowly sold off and took profit and left which dropped the price.

Its mostly pressure from regulators and changes of rules, which i understand also. I do believe XMR will go far they way its going.

But, I expect more vigorous regulation from governments on all untraceable cryptos. They may have whatever lame excuses but you cannot convince investors to continue their holding or a new investor will to adapt it. It all means, only the real users may adapt and use it in best cases. So, these will definitely reflect on price level.

[OmegaStarScream]

But, I expect more vigorous regulation from governments on all untraceable cryptos. They may have whatever lame excuses but you cannot convince investors to continue their holding or a new investor will to adapt it. It all means, only the real users may adapt and use it in best cases. So, these will definitely reflect on price level.

It's not like they can get any worse to be honest. Besides, the people who really cares about their privacy, are probably not interested in buying XMR through KYC CEXes like Kucoin and Kraken either.
This is just a baseless guess, but I would imagine that non-KYC swap platforms have probably more trading volume when combined, compared to what's CMC is reporting, at any given time.

[d5000]

What some here seem to miss is that the market cap of privacy coins is still tiny. Monero, as the biggest privacy coin, has less than 10 billion, and even at the peak of this pump barely surpassed that value. Even Doge, a purely speculative memecoin, has a marketcap of 20 billion - that's more than all privacy coins (XMR, ZEC, Dash etc. ...) together!

I think the demand for privacy coins could become much higher as people increasingly want to pay electronically, but without sacrificing the privacy of cash. In many countries cash has still a very high acceptance and people will defend the right to pay with cash and would never vote anybody who threatens to forbid it.

Currently I have not really a preference for any privacy coin, as long as it isn't premined (so ZEC is not attractive for me). However, currently XMR seems to be the most established one, so the pump is "well deserved" even if it now dumped a bit again. I like the idea behind the Zcash mechanism and also Grin's MimbleWimble, but would love to see more research on which one of these is really superior.

To use XMR for payments, you need "stores" that accept this currency. I don't see much variety in such stores.

There are gift card vendors like Coincards accepting XMR and also other privacy coins like Dash, where you can access a large variety of products in many countries, including groceries. While you have a centralized intermediary in this case, normally to redeem these gift cards you don't need to provide your personal data (if paying in a real world shop) and thus the privacy level is similar to paying in cash.

we can safely say that there was a moment some whale entered and that was probably it.

I disagree. Profit taking is expected in such pumps, even massively. And $450 is still an very high price for XMR, close to pre-2026s ATHs.

[SirLancelot]

If something was 450 a month ago and 480 now, that's not a pump, just because it had a pump in the middle that is not good for it. It had a pump and dump scheme basically, and been down 20%+ for the last week alone.

So yeah, it peaked for a while but that was basically hype and also probably a pump and dump,  and that is what we have seen, monero still sucks and still banned from many nations and still not listed in most places all of which combined makes it a bad investment. You can still enjoy it if you want to, this is personal preference and some people likes it and I am fine with that, but just because you like it doesn't mean everyone else will, and it will stay something small compared to many others.

[d5000]

If something was 450 a month ago and 480 now, that's not a pump, just because it had a pump in the middle that is not good for it. It had a pump and dump scheme basically, and been down 20%+ for the last week alone.
[...] monero still sucks and still banned from many nations

I honestly don't think an altcoin which was at $100-$150 2 years ago only and now is at $470 "sucks". It only crossed $200 a year ago

See the Coingecko chart since 2024:


There has been a continuous uptrend, stronger than Bitcoin's or other altcoins'. In hindsight XMR was one of the best investments in the last years, particularly since early and mid 2024, when you invested in that year it even surpassed gold (XMR: ~200%, Gold: ~100%). Only silver was even better ...

Compare that with the ultra-hyped Solana with a minuscule ATH (it's now lower than in 2024) and ETH which didn't achieve any ATH

And no, Monero isn't banned in many nations, a full ban exists imo only in the UAE, where a lot of things are banned, including intercourse outside marriage, WhatsApp calls and even e-cigarettes.