A reported discount for XRP on Coinbase compared with Binance on Nov. 2 largely disappears when the Binance price is adjusted for the dollar value of its Tether (USDT) quote, according to an analysis of exchange data.
The user Arab Chain on CryptoQuant reported an approximately -0.16% XRP Coinbase Premium Index reading on Nov. 2, describing it as an eight-month low and interpreting it as relatively weaker Coinbase demand. The post also cautioned that the index alone was not definitive evidence of continued downside pressure.
What the dollar conversion changes
The completed Nov. 2 candles put Coinbase XRP/USD at $1.2481, Binance XRP/USDT at 1.2502 USDT and Coinbase USDT/USD at $0.99838.
The adjustment multiplies Binance’s XRP price by USDT’s dollar price, then compares Coinbase against that converted figure. Expressed as a percentage, the formula is:
100 × [Coinbase XRP/USD ÷ (Binance XRP/USDT × USDT/USD) − 1].
This uses Coinbase’s USDT/USD market as the conversion reference. It is a venue price, rather than a universal redemption rate or evidence about why USDT traded below one dollar.
How much survives the conversion?
For the November 2, 2026 UTC close, the raw gap was -0.168% and the dollar-adjusted gap was -0.006%. The remaining dollar-price gap is close to zero.
Across all seven completed UTC daily observations, the adjustment narrowed the discount, but did not eliminate it every day:
- Oct. 27: raw -0.135%; dollar-adjusted -0.001%
- Oct. 28: raw -0.128%; dollar-adjusted -0.019%
- Oct. 29: raw -0.226%; dollar-adjusted -0.002%
- Oct. 30: raw -0.199%; dollar-adjusted -0.066%
- Oct. 31: raw -0.200%; dollar-adjusted -0.078%
- Nov. 1: raw -0.128%; dollar-adjusted +0.002%
- Nov. 2: raw -0.168%; dollar-adjusted -0.006%
Negative values mean Coinbase was cheaper, while positive values mean it was more expensive. Figures are rounded to three decimal places from the three exchange datasets.
Oct. 30 and 31 adjusted discounts remained about 0.066% and 0.078%, respectively, and the Nov. 2 finding supports checking the currency conversion.
A separate check used 60 matched one-minute buckets from Nov. 2, 12:00-12:59 UTC, combining Coinbase XRP/USD, Binance XRP/USDT and Coinbase USDT/USD. Its median raw gap was about -0.128%, and the median dollar-adjusted gap was approximately +0.006%.
XRP was near $1.28 on Nov. 3. Around 13:15 UTC, Coinbase’s ticker reported a $1.276 last trade, above its $1.2481 Nov. 2 close, while Binance’s rolling ticker showed 1.2780 USDT.
What would establish weaker XRP demand?
A relative-demand warning would be more persuasive if a discount persisted after currency conversion alongside comparatively heavier seller-initiated XRP trading over equivalent windows.
The measurement stops short of an executable arbitrage test. Coinbase defines candle closes as the last trade within each bucket, while Binance’s candles use matching time intervals. Rounding, bid-ask spreads, fees, and differences between venues are important when a residual gap is this small.
An August 2025 XRP liquidity study exposed a similar disconnect: XRP prices remained closely aligned across Binance and Coinbase even as trading activity was concentrated in different quote currencies.
Price consistency does not guarantee equally accessible liquidity, and traders may see nearly identical quotes but face substantially different execution costs and slippage, particularly during periods of market stress.
On Nov. 2’s closing observations, the unadjusted gap by itself substantially overstates the remaining dollar-price difference.
