Ripple has hit back at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), accusing it of creating more uncertainty and failing in its duty to protect the crypto community. In panning the SEC’s decision to designate its XRP token as a security, the company claims the regulator’s lawsuit against it amounts to an attack on the entire crypto market in the US.
XRP Token Holders Affected
The latest comments by the Ripple team follow reports of the delisting of the XRP token by Coinbase. In a short statement released on December 29, the firm, which is promising another “response in a few weeks to address these unproven allegations against Ripple”, starts by claiming that the public and the media are currently only aware of the SEC’s narrative.
The Ripple team then assails the SEC’s $1.3 billion lawsuit against the company arguing that it has affected “innocent XRP retail holders.” Since the announcement of the lawsuit, the XRP token has now lost more than 50% of its value and the trend is set to continue as more exchanges delist the token. The Ripple statement explains:
We’ve always said that there is a dangerous lack of regulatory clarity for crypto in the U.S. — their lawsuit has already affected countless innocent XRP retail holders with no connection to Ripple. It has also needlessly muddied the waters for exchanges, market makers and traders.
Ripple Customers Outside the US
Meanwhile, the Ripple team, whose executives have previously threatened to pull out of the United States, is also reiterating the assertion that the token is mainly traded outside that country.
“The majority of our customers aren’t in the U.S. and overall XRP volume is largely traded outside of the U.S. There are clear rules of the road for using XRP in the UK, Japan, Switzerland, and Singapore, for example,” reads the Ripple statement.
In the meantime, the Ripple team says it is prepared to defend itself in court although the statement suggests that the company is also pinning its hopes on the incoming SEC leadership. The tenure of the Jay Clayton led SEC board, which made the decision to file the lawsuit against Ripple, recently ended. Following Clayton’s departure, lawyer Elad Roisman has been appointed the acting chairperson.
New SEC Board Unlikely to Change Course
However, others like lawyer Jake Chervinsky say the odds are still against Ripple winning despite the board changes. In a Twitter post, Chervinsky says:
It’s extremely unlikely that changes in SEC leadership will have any impact on the Ripple case. Given Comm’r Peirce’s conspicuous silence, I’d guess the vote was unanimous in favor of filing. Regardless, the case is being prosecuted by enforcement lawyers who are here to stay.
Interestingly, while the SEC has already ruled that bitcoin and ethereum are not securities, that has not stopped bitcoin opponents like Peter Schiff from entertaining the thought. In his latest tirade against bitcoin, Schiff weighs into the Ripple/XRP debacle by asking what would happen if the SEC similarly designated bitcoin as a security.
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