- Ripple Labs and its executives gained another victory recently in their ongoing legal battle against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
- Judge Sarah Netburn denied the SEC access to the personal banking information of Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen.
- Mike Novogratz suggests that the recent XRP price hike could indicate an ongoing solution.
The XRP price has risen despite the $ 1.3 billion ongoing lawsuit filed by the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) against Ripple Labs.
Another legal victory for Ripple
The U.S. SEC alleged that Ripple Labs and its executives, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen, were illegally selling XRP tokens as an unregistered stock offering.
Charges have left cryptocurrencies to begin withdrawing testimony and the price of cross-border digital currency fell after the lawsuit was announced.
So far, Ripple and his executives have been fine, as Judge Sarah Netburn got another victory in the lawsuit. The judge accepted the defendants’ motion to deny the SEC access to Garlinghouse and Larsen’s personal financial information.
He added that obtaining this information was not relevant to the case and that the SEC has not presented evidence that the two executives have covert transactions.
Prior to the latest development of the case, Judge Netburn also issued an explosive statement in March, saying XRP is a currency and has utility. Shortly afterwards, Judge Analisa Torres responded to the XRP investors’ request, led by attorney John Deaton to file a motion to intervene in the case.
Another big 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 allow Ripple to search for documents where the regulator could refer to XRP as a “virtual currency”, similar to the two largest cryptocurrencies.
Matthew Solomon, Garlinghouse’s attorney, said he believes it could be a “final game” for the whole case if the defense found information that suggests the SEC believes or believes XRP was like Bitcoin or Ether.
The rise in XRP prices could indicate an ongoing settlement
As optimism continues to grow for Ripple, the XRP price has risen more than 112% last week. Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz said the XRP rally could indicate an agreement between Ripple and the SEC.
According to the CEO of Galaxy Digital, given that the company’s share capital is trading between $ 2,000 and $ 3 billion in the secondary market, he believes it is “cheap madness” if a deal is reached. However, if Ripple does not come close to settling with the SEC, XRP may be overpriced.
In response to Novogratz’s statements about a settlement, attorney Stephen Palley said there is no “public” indication that a resolution will come soon. Palley said:
I don’t know how the price can be correlated with the settlement, unless someone has inside information about the possible SEC settlement / resolution and the ability of the exchanges to re-list for trading.
While the legal battle between Ripple and the SEC is far from over, Andrew Hinkes, a lawyer and professor at NYU, believes Ripple’s legal victories so far have been significant. According to him, the most likely outcome will be a negotiated agreement.
Garglinghouse continues to hope the two sides can hold a meaningful conversation once the U.S. Senate confirms the new SEC administration.
XRP will continue its winning streak
The growing sentiment in the XRP market 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 consistently traded above $ 1, a level reached for the first time since 2018. The current XRP trading volume has surpassed the 2017-2018 race, which could further drive up the price XRP. During the current 2017 race, when XRP was trading at current levels, it only took less than a week for the price to reach the all-time high of $ 3.32.