On September 29th, Ripple Labs won its ongoing legal battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). William Hinman was the former director of the SEC’s Corporation Finance Division. District Court Judge Analisa Torres ordered the publication of the records William Hinman authored. Most of the materials pertain to his speech at the Yahoo Finance All Markets Summit in June 2018.
Hinman emphasised that Ether (ETH) was not secure in his address. Ripple Labs views the speech as crucial evidence in the action the SEC has taken against it, saying that sales of Ripple’s XRP violated US securities laws. However, it remains to be seen if the terminology used in the speech will be as significant as the firm claims. The circumstances of the speech and Hinman’s preceding actions are a factor in the misunderstanding.
The judgment of Judge Torres dismissed SEC objections to the release of the materials, following District Court Judge Sarah Netburn’s ruling that the emails and drafts of the speech were not protected by deliberative process privilege, as the SEC had asserted. The SEC subsequently stated attorney-client privilege over the materials, a position that Netburn rejected in July. The judgement of Judge Torres overturned the SEC’s objections to that decision.
In December 2020, the SEC filed a lawsuit against Ripple Labs and its current and former CEOs, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen, alleging that the company’s cryptocurrency, XRP, is a security as it was used to raise funding in 2013. This is an unusual instance of an SEC lawsuit proceeding to trial, which might result in a precedent-setting ruling instead of a settlement.
Ripple originally appeared to be losing the lawsuit, and the business has explored a range of defence measures. Ripple Labs and the SEC filed papers for summary judgement in the United States on September 17th. District Court for New York’s Southern District.
