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Former Ripple CTO Stefan Thomas says the SEC only charged Ripple due to what other crypto projects did during the 2017 ICO wave.
As the lawsuit between the SEC and Ripple approaches its end, top crypto stakeholders have been commenting on how the case outcome will impact the industry.
Ripple Lawsuit Will Determine How SEC Treats Crypto
Stefan Thomas, the co-creator of Interledger Protocol, is one of the latest industry stakeholders to speak on the topic. In a recent interview with Thinking Crypto, Thomas said the lawsuit’s outcome will determine how the SEC will treat the U.S. crypto industry.
He noted that it is unsurprising to see more industry players back Ripple as they now understand that the lawsuit’s outcome affects everyone. According to him, this was already clear to him from the beginning.
2017 ICO Wave Attracted SEC to Crypto
Furthermore, Thomas stated that the SEC only became interested in crypto after the 2017 Initial Coin Offering (ICO) wave. According to Thomas, whether XRP is a security would not have emerged before 2016.
Thomas said he experimented on Google to understand if XRP security status was an issue before 2017. Per Thomas, he searched for the phrase “Is XRP a security?” on Google to find any material about the topic before 2016.
Although the result showed “two hits,” Thomas said the articles were misdated from 2018. Thomas, who worked at Ripple as CTO, said no one bothered to ask whether XRP was security on any online forum before 2016.
Notably, industry leaders regard 2017 as the year of the ICO boom due to the numerous crypto-focused initial coin offerings conducted that year. These included ICOs from Polkadot, Tezos, EOS, and Filecoin. These ICOs captured the attention of global regulators.
Thomas Explains Why SEC Came After XRP
Interestingly, Thomas asserted that the development suggests the SEC came after XRP due to the actions of these other crypto projects during the 2017 ICO wave.
“And I thought that was very interesting to me [because] it is like it is not because of what Ripple did or the XRP community did that the SEC came after XRP. It was because of what other people did in other projects that prompted the agency to go after XRP,” said Thomas.
He added that The idea of the SEC going after Ripple because of the actions and inactions of other crypto projects “leaves a bad taste in the mouth.”
Ex-Ripple CTO Hopes SEC Loses
Thomas said the SEC was wrong to go after Ripple. However, he claims not to have any ill will against the commission.
Thomas said he hopes the regulatory agency loses the lawsuit against Ripple when Judge Analisa Torres issues her decision.
Meanwhile, the SEC v. Ripple lawsuit is expected to wrap up before the end of the year. Many legal experts, including John Deaton, have been predicting different aspects of the ruling.
As reported earlier, Attorney Deaton predicts Judge Torres will comment on XRP secondary market sales in her upcoming ruling. He also speculated that the SEC would lose its case against Ripple executives Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen.
Per Deaton, the recently released Hinman docs will impact the case against Ripple execs.