Ripple chief executive officer, Brad Garlinghouse, stated in July that the crypto company will relocate if it loses its legal dispute with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Well, it looks like Garlinghouse will just have to stay put and not go anywhere. Ripple has just won a major victory against the SEC in court.
On Friday, New York judge Analisa Torres decided that documents written by former SEC Corporation Finance Division Director William Hinman, including emails, must be turned over.
“We believe the law and the facts are on our side,” the Ripple CEO told Protocol in July, adding they will transfer to another jurisdiction “if we lose the case in the United States.”
JUST IN: 🇺🇸 Judge overrules and orders SEC to turn over Hinman documents in the #Ripple case.
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) September 29, 2022
Court To SEC: Release The Documents
The backstory of the speech may hold the key to debunk the commission’s central legal claim, which is that Ripple neglected to register approximately $1.4 billion in XRP tokens as securities in 2013.
The SEC, which brought the complaint against the cryptocurrency company in December 2020, challenged the decision in July, but must now reveal the information in accordance with the court’s verdict.
The case was anticipated to last until early 2023 and might have far-reaching consequences for the broader cryptocurrency industry. These materials represent a potential turning point in favor of Ripple.
William Hinman, former director of the SEC’s Division of Corporation Finance. Image: Mosttraded.com
Ether (ETH) Is Not A Security, Hinman Says
What is the Hinman Speech?
The remarks by Hinman in 2018 validated Ripple’s position that XRP, the cryptocurrency that runs on the public and decentralized blockchain ledger, was a commodity and/or a virtual money.
Definitely not a security.
In that speech, Hinman argues that Ether (ETH) was not a security. This is one of the main contexts of the much sought-after Hinman Speech.
Previously, the regulator contended that Hinman’s views in the documents did not reflect the agency’s policy stance.
Ripple claims that the records are crucial because they could be used to collect “possible impeachment evidence.”
Shot Block
According to the letter submitted by Judge Torres, the court rejected all three of the SEC’s motions to the release of the Hinman speech’s internal papers.
Judge Torres’ letter reads:
“The Court has reviewed the remainder of the thorough and well-reasoned Orders for clear error and finds none… Accordingly, the Court OVERRULES the SEC’s objections and directs the SEC to comply with the Orders.”
XRP Rallies After Court Ruling
Following the news, XRP’s price traded at $0.50 Friday, up 15% in the last 24 hours, data from Coingecko show.
The issue has piqued the interest of crypto specialists and members of the Ripple community, with the potential ramifications reverberating throughout the cryptosphere.
Despite the setbacks, Garlinghouse has never wavered in his belief that Ripple would win the case and eventually go public, at least in the United States.
XRP total market cap at $24.3 billion on the daily chart | Source: TradingView.com Featured image from ActiveChristianity, Chart: TradingView.com