Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse recently commented on the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) long-running legal battle against his firm. This comes amid recent developments which suggest that the case could soon end.
SEC’s Lawsuit Against Ripple Could Come To An End “Very Soon”
Garlinghouse mentioned during an interview with Bloomberg that the SEC’s case against Ripple could end “very soon,” although he added that they can’t predict when exactly the judge will give her ruling. Meanwhile, Garlinghous declined to comment when asked if his firm and the SEC were currently in settlement talks.
The appropriate remedies regarding Ripple’s violation of securities laws following Judge Analisa Torres’ ruling remain the only issue left to be decided in this long-running legal battle. Although Judge Torres ruled that XRP wasn’t a security in itself, she also declared that Ripple’s XRP sales to institutional investors were investment contracts. As such, the crypto firm violated securities laws by selling unregistered securities.
Ripple and the SEC have disagreed on the appropriate remedies for such violations. The Commission initially proposed a pecuniary fine of almost $2 billion before eventually reducing it to $102.6 million. On the other hand, Ripple has proposed that a fine of not more than $10 million should be awarded against them.
Despite both parties being at loggerheads, there have been speculations that Ripple and the SEC may still be negotiating an out-of-court settlement. Brett Hill, an ambassador from the crypto exchange Bitrue, recently mentioned that a closed meeting that the SEC was initially set to have on July 18 was connected to a settlement between the crypto firm and the regulator.
However, according to information obtained from the SEC’s website, this closed-door meeting wasn’t eventually held on July 18 as proposed. Instead, it is now set to hold on July 25, although it remains uncertain whether the agenda indeed has anything to do with the Commission’s case against Ripple.
One Year On: The Impact Of Judge Torres’ Ruling
July 13 marked a year since Judge Torres delivered her historic ruling, declaring that XRP isn’t a security in itself. Reflecting on this moment, Ripple’s Chief Legal Officer (CLO) Stuart Alderoty took to his X (formerly Twitter) platform to highlight how this decision has impacted the crypto industry since then.
Alderoty noted that Judge Torres’ decision has led to a large number of similar decisions, with the Binance case being the most recent. In it, US District Judge Amy Berman ruled that the crypto exchange’s BNB sales weren’t investment contracts. The Ripple CLO added that these decisions recognize the “SEC’s gross overreach and lack of faithful allegiance to the law under Chair Gensler.”
While Alderoty admitted that the SEC’s case Ripple isn’t “fully over,” he asserted that the court’s ruling that XRP isn’t a security “will not change” as even the SEC has told the court that it doesn’t plan to challenge the ruling.
