I understand the distinction between Ripple and XRP, and it is certainly true that XRP has its own fair share of good news, along with Ripple... but that rarely if ever seems to translate into the sort of price movement we would see for other coins.
Not sure why this is, or how much the token-dumping by Ripple plays a part... but regardless, XRP still has a really solid use case and looks good for the long-term.
My guess: really really rich people see potential, and manipulate price so they could buy large amounts cheap
It is impossible to determine if the price is low or high, because double number or more coins can be created at any time and its value will be halved or can drop few times. Therefore, it is a great tool for speculators, but for long-term investors it can be a trap.