July 14, 2023 (MLN): In a major win for the crypto world, the U.S. judge has dismissed the claim that Ripple Labs Inc violated federal securities law by selling its XRP token on public exchanges, providing a huge relief to the millions of XRP holders and a vindication for not just the vision of Ripple Labs, but the whole industry.
The judge also ruled that institutional sales of XRP by Ripple were securities.
XRP surged 99.79% yesterday, from $0.47 to $0.93 within a few hours, and consequently closed with a gain of 73% on Thursday.
Remarkably, XRP surpassed BNB to take the place of the third largest cryptocurrency (excluding stablecoins), with a market capitalization of $41.45 billion, as per Coingecko data.
While the trading volume of the spot XRP/USDT pair on Binance, the most liquid exchange, surged to around $2bn, which is 10x more than the average traded volume in the past few months.
Similarly, this news propelled the whole trillion-dollar crypto industry, consequently, taking the global cryptocurrency market capitalization to $1.24 trillion, registering a 6.34% rise in the past 24 hours.
Ripple Chief Executive Brad Garlinghouse in an interview called the ruling "a huge win for Ripple but more importantly for the industry overall in the U.S."
Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN), the largest U.S. crypto exchange, said it would again allow trading of XRP on its platform.
Coinbase chief legal officer Paul Grewal said on Twitter, "We’ve read Judge Torres’ thoughtful decision. We’ve carefully reviewed our analysis. It’s time to relist,"
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres marks the first huge win for the cryptocurrency industry, as a matter of law, XRP is not a security.
Stuart Alderoty Chief Legal Officer of Ripple emphasized this by saying, as a matter of law, sales on exchanges are not securities. Sales by executives are not securities. Other XRP distributions to developers, to charities, to employees are not securities.
David Brill, former deputy general counsel of bankrupt crypto broker Voyager Digital stated that this ruling from the Ripple case should bode well for Coinbase, because it “undermines the SEC’s position that tokens sold on Coinbase’s platform were sales of unregistered securities.”
Whether cryptocurrencies are securities have been a major question hanging over the industry, which has long fought efforts to regulate them by arguing that they are not.
The SEC sued Coinbase in June for the sale of unregistered securities.
To recall, the SEC had accused the company (RIPPLE) and its current and former chief executives of conducting a $1.3bn unregistered securities offering by selling XRP, which Ripple's founders created in 2012.
The case has been closely watched in the cryptocurrency industry, which disputes the SEC's assertion that the vast majority of crypto tokens are securities and subject to its strict investor protection rules.
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Posted on: 2023-07-14T11:30:48+05:00
