Ripple v. SEC case update as of October 9, 2023

Amid the long-running court standoff between Ripple and the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), another battle wages on social media – between those who believe that the recent court decision has no major impact on the cryptocurrency industry and those who disagree.

As it happens, former SEC attorney John Reed Stark commented on Judge Analisa Torres’s recent rejection of the agency’s request for an interlocutory appeal, referring to it as “a pyrrhic victory at best for the XRP team,” in an X post published on October 6.

Impact on cryptoverse

According to Stark, the regulator “will still undoubtedly appeal the decision after the trial, and I believe, have a good chance of winning,” as the Judge “has specifically deemed her decision as NOT precedent for the rest [of the] cryptoverse.”

Furthermore, he dismissed the importance of Judge Torres’s most recent decision “as precedent on the issue of whether tokens are securities,” arguing that “the Court did not hold that offers and sales on a digital asset exchange cannot create a reasonable expectation of profits based on the efforts of others.”

Specifically, the former SEC enforcement lawyer said that “the Court held that based on the totality of the circumstances in this case, including an examination of the facts, circumstances, and economic realities of the transactions, Ripple’s Programmatic Sales could not lead investors to reasonably expect profits from Ripple’s efforts (emphasis in original).”

Commenting on Stark’s post, the blockchain company’s chief legal officer Stuart Alderoty pointed out:

“Agree to disagree on the legal impact of Judge Torres’ rulings, but you also seem to be saying that XRP uniquely stands as the only digital asset (other than BTC) with judicial clarity as a non-security. There we are on the same page.”

Probable outcomes

At the same time, lawyer Jeremy Hogan listed a number of possible outcomes for the Ripple v. SEC case after the Judge denied an interlocutory appeal motion, including the regulator moving forward with a “trial next April against the individual Defendants” and an appeal of the case no sooner than 2025, and an appellate ruling until 2026 earliest.

Other possibilities include the SEC settling the case against the individual Defendants and moving forward “with obtaining a Final Judgment against Ripple, and then appeal,” as well as the SEC settling “all litigation against Ripple and the individual Defendants” during a settlement conference on April 16, 2024.

Meanwhile, the XRP token that is at the center of the ongoing legal battle was at press time changing hands at the price of $0.514, recording a decline of 1.5% on the day and dropping 1.32% across the past week, while it gained 2.15% in the last month, as per the recent data on October 9.

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