Sarah Tran
Independent Analyst
- Ripple Labs and its executives scored another victory recently in its ongoing legal battle against the US Securities & Exchange Commission.
- Judge Sarah Netburn denied the SEC access to the personal banking information of Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen.
- Mike Novogratz suggests the recent XRP price rally could indicate a settlement in progress.
The XRP price has rallied despite the ongoing $1.3 billion lawsuit filed by the US Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) against Ripple Labs.
Another legal victory for Ripple
The US SEC alleged that Ripple Labs and its executives, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen, illegally sold XRP tokens as an unregistered securities offering.
The charges have left crypto exchanges to start delisting the token, and the cross-border digital currency's price plunged following the lawsuit's announcement.
So far, Ripple and its executives have been on a roll, as Judge Sarah Netburn delivered another win in the lawsuit. The judge granted the defendants' motion to reject the SEC's access to Garlinghouse and Larsen's personal financial information.
She added that obtaining this information was not relevant to the case and that the SEC has not presented evidence that the two executives have hidden transactions.
Prior to the latest development in the case, Judge Netburn also dropped a bombshell statement in March, saying that XRP is a currency and has utility. Shortly after, Judge Analisa Torres granted XRP investors' request, led by attorney John Deaton, to submit a motion to intervene in the case.
Another major win for the blockchain firm was when Judge Netburn ruled in favor of granting Ripple Labs access to the SEC's internal discussions on Bitcoin and Ethereum. This could enable Ripple's seeking of documents where XRP could be mentioned by the regulator as a "virtual currency," similar to the two largest cryptocurrencies.
Matthew Solomon, Garlinghouse's counsel, said that he believes it could be "game over" for the whole case if the defense were to find information that suggests the SEC believes or thought XRP was like Bitcoin or Ether.
XRP price surge could indicate a settlement in progress
As optimism continues to grow for Ripple, the XRP price has surged by over 112% in the past week. Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz claimed that the XRP rally could indicate that a settlement between Ripple and the SEC is in progress.
According to the Galaxy Digital CEO, since the company's equity is trading at around $2 billion to $3 billion in the secondary market, he believes it is "crazy cheap" if a settlement is coming. However, if Ripple is not close to settling with the SEC, XRP may be overpriced.
Responding to Novogratz's statements on a settlement, lawyer Stephen Palley said that there is no "public" indication that a resolution is coming soon. Palley said:
I don't know how one can correlate price itself to settlement unless someone has inside information about potential SEC settlement/ resolution and ability for exchanges to re-list for trading.
Although Ripple and the SEC's legal battle is far from over, Andrew Hinkes, attorney and NYU professor, believes that Ripple's legal victories so far were significant. The most likely outcome, according to him, will be a negotiated settlement.
Garglinghouse remains hopeful that both sides could have a meaningful conversation once the US Senate confirms the new SEC administration.
XRP to continue its winning streak
XRP's growing market sentiment could also be due to a rumor surrounding Coinbase preparing to relist XRP. A community member hinted at this after a discovery was made in a few lines of code in the Coinbase Pro API.
Since April 9, XRP has traded steadily above $1, a level reached for the first time since 2018. Current XRP trading volume has surpassed the bull run of 2017 to 2018, which could push the XRP price even further. During the bull run in 2017, when XRP was trading at current levels, it only took less than a week for the price to reach its all-time high of $3.32.
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