Ripple CEO: SEC Drops Case in ‘Resounding’ Victory for Crypto
The Security and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) case against Ripple has concluded, according to that company’s CEO.
In a post Wednesday (March 19) on X, Brad Garlinghouse wrote that the commission had dropped its appeal in its case against the blockchain company, the latest in a string of cryptocurrency enforcement efforts called off by the regulator since President Donald Trump took office.
This is it — the moment we’ve been waiting for. The SEC will drop its appeal — a resounding victory for Ripple, for crypto, every way you look at it.
The future is bright. Let’s build. pic.twitter.com/7WsD0C92Cm
— Brad Garlinghouse (@bgarlinghouse) March 19, 2025
“This is it — the moment weʼve been waiting for,” Garlinghouse wrote. “The SEC will drop its appeal — a resounding victory for Ripple, for crypto, every way you look at it.”
An SEC spokesperson declined to comment when reached by PYMNTS.
The SEC sued Ripple in 2020, alleging that the company violated the regulator’s rules by selling its XRP digital token without registering it as a security. But in June 2023, a judge ruled that XRP was covered by securities laws only when it was sold to institutional investors.
Since then, Ripple has been trumpeting win after win in the case, first when the SEC withdrew charges against its executives, and later when the judge in the case fined the company $125 million, far below the $2 billion sought by the commission.
It was that ruling, handed down last year, that the SEC had said it would appeal. Then Trump became president, and Washington’s attitudes towards the crypto sector shifted.
In the past few weeks, the SEC has either dismissed or paused cases or investigations into some of the most high-profile companies in the digital asset space. This includes the lawsuits against crypto giants Coinbase and Binance — sued within 24 hours of each other in the summer of 2023 — as well as potential legal action against Robinhood.
In another sign of the changing crypto landscape, the SEC said earlier this week it was rethinking a proposed rule that would extend investment advisers’ custodial requirements to crypto.
SEC Acting Chairman Mark T. Uyeda spoke before the Investment Company Institute on Monday (March 17) and said the regulator is working with the White House’s crypto task force to consider alternatives to this proposal, including withdrawing it entirely.
“With respect to the safeguarding proposal, commenters expressed significant concern with the broad scope of the proposed safeguarding rule for investment advisers, which would extend the custodial requirements to virtually any asset, including crypto,” Uyeda said.
The SEC proposed expanding investment adviser custody rules to crypto assets in February 2023, saying they would widen the rules from client funds and securities to any client assets held by an investment adviser, thus making sure qualified custodians keep client assets segregated and protected in case of insolvency of the custodian.
Gary Gensler, SEC chair at the time, said Congress had given the commission authority to expand the custody rule to apply to all assets, not only funds or securities.
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