In late August 2025, the crypto market is generally in a period of oscillation and adjustment — Bitcoin is fluctuating slightly in the range of $45,000 to $47,000, while mainstream altcoins (such as ETH and SOL) are seeing 24-hour increases concentrated around 3%-5%. In contrast, the IP token stands out with a 10% single-day increase, becoming the focus of the recent market. Notably, its core ecological metric, 'Total Locked Value (TVL),' has risen by 12%, climbing from $22.77 million ($25.5 million ÷ 1.12 ≈ $22.76 million) to $25.5 million. This dual rise in 'price - TVL' suggests that market confidence is not solely reliant on short-term speculation, but rather supported by actual capital accumulation.
I. TVL breaks above $25.5 million: Ecological penetration confirms the foundation of the uptrend.
TVL, as a core metric for measuring user stickiness in blockchain projects, tends to reflect ecological health better than price movements. According to DeFiLlama data from August 27, the growth of the IP token's TVL mainly comes from three major sectors:
Staking pool: The amount of funds for users staking IP to obtain ecological governance rights has reached $14.8 million, a 15% increase from 24 hours ago, accounting for 58% of the total TVL.
Liquidity mining: In the IP-USDT trading pairs on platforms like Uniswap and PancakeSwap, the locked liquidity has reached $7.2 million, an increase of 9%.
Lending market: The scale of borrowing funds using IP as collateral has reached $3.5 million, an increase of 11%, indicating that some investors are starting to use IP for leveraged operations.
"This is different from mere price speculation," said Nansen analyst Alice Wang. "The synchronous growth of TVL means that investors are not just 'trading' IP, but also 'using' IP — either participating in ecological governance or earning mining rewards. This deep binding will make the upward trend more resilient."
II. Liquidity clusters indicate target price: $1.9-$2.1 is a key range.
Combining Coinglass's liquidity heat map data as of August 27 at 18:00 (UTC+8), the current spot price of the IP token is $1.82, with a significant liquidity cluster forming in the $1.9-$2.1 range.
$1.90-$1.95: A total of $3.2 million in limit buy orders has gathered, accounting for 23% of the current market's total buy orders, mainly from small and medium-sized trading addresses (holding 10,000 - 100,000 IP).
$2.05-$2.10: There is a liquidity reserve of $2.8 million, which includes some whale addresses (holding ≥500,000 IP), and this range is also near the high point for the IP token in June of this year ($2.12).
Historically, when liquidity clusters are located above the spot price, prices often exhibit a 'magnetic effect' — in May 2025, the SOL token saw a similar liquidity distribution in the $98-$102 range, after which the price rose from $95 to $101 within 36 hours, validating this logic. "If the spot trading volume can remain above $5 million in the next 24 hours (current 24-hour trading volume is $4.82 million), buyers are likely to push the price to test the first target at $1.95," said AMBCrypto analyst Tom Chen. "However, it should be noted that this range is also a dense area for previous trapped positions, where some investors holding positions above $1.9 may choose to take profits."
III. Risk warning: Be wary of overbought signals and whale movements.
Although there are clear bullish signals in the short term, there are still two major risk points in the market:
Technical indicators are approaching overbought levels: As of August 27, the 1-hour RSI (Relative Strength Index) of the IP token has reached 68, close to the overbought threshold of 70. In the past three instances when the RSI touched this range, prices experienced corrections of 5%-8%.
Whale address activity: Nansen's on-chain data shows that on the morning of August 27, two whale addresses, holding 620,000 and 480,000 IP respectively, transferred a total of 1.1 million IP (worth about $2 million) out of Binance. It is currently unclear whether these funds are for long-term locking or short-term cashing out — if whales choose to sell above $1.9, it could trigger a chain reaction.
More critically, changes in retail investors' willingness to follow: Over the past 24 hours, the trading volume of small addresses holding <10,000 IP has decreased from 35% to 30%, while the trading volume of whale addresses has increased from 28% to 34%, indicating a wait-and-see sentiment among retail investors regarding the current increase. "Altcoin markets often rely on a model of 'whales leading + retail following'; if retail investors continue to hesitate, the upward momentum may lose steam around $1.9," warned Lily Zhang, a strategist at the crypto trading platform OKX. "Investors need to closely monitor whether TVL continues to grow — if TVL shows a decline, even if the price increases, it may be 'overvalued.'"
IV. Recommendations for traders' next steps.
Based on current market signals, different types of traders can adopt differentiated strategies:
Short-term speculators: If the price breaks above $1.95 and trading volume increases, consider taking a light long position with a target of $2.05 and a stop-loss set at $1.75 (current support level). If the price stalls near $1.9 and the RSI exceeds 70, consider trying a short position with 5%-10% of your portfolio.
Long-term investors: Focus on the matching degree between TVL and price — if TVL can maintain above $25 million and the number of new staking users within the ecosystem continues to grow (currently averaging 500 new users daily), consider accumulating in batches in the $1.7-$1.8 range.
Risk-averse investors: Wait for clear breakout signals — either the price stabilizes above $2.1 (confirming trend continuation) or pulls back to $1.6 (testing strong support), avoiding frequent trades in the oscillation range.
As of the market close on August 27, the IP token is priced at $1.85, with a 24-hour increase narrowing to 8.5%, and the TVL remains stable at $25.3 million. "This week's performance of IP has brought it into the institutional spotlight," said Mike Lee, an analyst at crypto asset management firm Grayscale. "However, the volatility of altcoins is always higher than that of mainstream coins, and investors need to find a balance between 'trend dividends' and 'risk control.'"
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