A federal judge has signed off on an order allowing the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to request certain financial documents from Ripple.
In a Feb. 5 filing in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn granted a motion from the SEC requiring Ripple to produce financial statements from 2022 to 2023 and contracts governing “institutional sales” — one of the critical issues concerning whether XRP qualifies as a security. The post-complaint contracts could allow the SEC to rebut Ripple’s claims that its conduct has complied with the court following the initial filing.
“The controversy before this Court is whether to order Ripple to answer this interrogatory and not what weight to assign to Ripple’s response,” said Judge Netburn regarding the request for post-complaint XRP institutional sales proceeds. “Because the SEC has made a sufficient showing that this information may assist the Court in fashioning its remedy, Ripple must respond to the Interrogatory.”
The SEC filed its lawsuit against Ripple and executives Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen in December 2020, alleging the parties offered unregistered securities through XRP tokens. In July 2023, a judge granted summary judgment in favor of Ripple, ruling that XRP was only a security when sold to institutional investors. The SEC later moved to dismiss its case against Garlinghouse and Larsen but not Ripple.
Judge Netburn set a deadline of Feb. 12 for Ripple to comply with the order for information. In a Jan. 19 letter opposing the SEC’s motion to produce information, Ripple’s legal team argued that the commission’s request was “untimely” and failed to justify the reasons for the order. The SEC v. Ripple trial is scheduled to begin in April.
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The SEC has filed enforcement actions against major U.S. exchanges, including Coinbase, Kraken and Binance. Ripple chief legal officer Stuart Alderoty has referred to the commission as an “out of control regulator” due to its position on crypto.
In January, a hacker compromised Larsen’s personal XRP wallets, stealing roughly $112 million worth of the token in one of the largest attacks in 2024. Binance announced on Feb. 1 that it had frozen $4.2 million worth of the stolen funds.
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