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Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

reuters.com

81–90 of 95 posts

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#81

"partial" win!? It's hard to see what would be a "win" otherwise... It's going to have also larger implications - the SEC somehow manages to lose that one, it was hard to imagine or predict. If not even XRP is a security, there is truly no other coins which could be a security. Hate it or love it, but the SEC is simply going to lose all their other lawsuits EDIT: oh funny ... Reuters edited their title and removed "p…

> Torres found the company's $728.9 million of XRP sales to hedge funds and other sophisticated buyers amounted to unregistered sales of securities It would probably have been a bigger win for Ripple had they gotten out of that one.

unregistered sales of securities aren’t violations of the securities act when relying on an exemption from registration, to accredited and qualified investors…

just because they might not have filed a Reg D notice for their SAFE doesnt mean the whole transaction is invalid

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#82
post #61
post #50

Great day for crypto and for financial freedom in general. Great to see the justice system finally rebuking these unelected bureaucrats and placing some limits on the power they claim to have.

The unelected bureaucrats are authorized by duly elected politicians. They do not coalesce in office from the ether, they're put there by elected officials. It's not like there's no oversight.

Um, the judge just ruled that they are NOT authorised by duly elected officials in this case. That's sort of the point of the case...

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#83
post #50

Great day for crypto and for financial freedom in general. Great to see the justice system finally rebuking these unelected bureaucrats and placing some limits on the power they claim to have.

Ripple still faces over $700m of unregistered security sales as part of the decision.

You don't have to register to sell to qualified investors right (which those were)?

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#84
post #61
post #50

Great day for crypto and for financial freedom in general. Great to see the justice system finally rebuking these unelected bureaucrats and placing some limits on the power they claim to have.

The unelected bureaucrats are authorized by duly elected politicians. They do not coalesce in office from the ether, they're put there by elected officials. It's not like there's no oversight.

They are not authorized to regulate which isn't their authority, they were breaking the law. I don't even like Ripple, I think it's a scam. But if the SEC can't even win on this one, which they clearly picked first because it would have been the easiest given it's extremely centralized nature, Gensler's game is over.

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not possible to sustain a magic money box where everyone can put money in and get more out. Many people get that far in their thinking, realise cryptocurrency is a bad investment, and leave it there.

The S&P 500 would argue otherwise

>The S&P 500 would argue otherwise

As a matter of fact, every scarce asset with steady demand would argue otherwise.

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A Rolex is a tangible art object that also performs a useful function. If, on the other hand, the issuing company sold NFTs with no tangible, functional, or aesthetic component and somehow sold people on the idea Rolex the company was going to pump these otherwise useless bits and bytes to the moon, then you're actually talking about something analogous to crypto.

There's literally nothing in existing law that identifies tangibility as a specific criteria for what constitutes a security and what constitutes a commodity. In fact both the CFTC and SEC are specifically on record as saying Bitcoin constitutes a commodity. And obviously Bitcoin is as intangible as it gets.

The Howey test's 4th prong refers to the value being derived from the work of others. When we're talking about a "commodity" that is intangible with no real-world application, function or value, respectfully those attributes are suggestive that the value derives from the "work of others." Maybe you and I and the SEC don't necessarily know the scope of the enterprise, but useless bits and bytes don't generally acquire value spontaneously so if one of them like ... XRP ... suddenly goes to the moon ... it certainly is suggestive because there's no other reasonable explanation.

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not possible to sustain a magic money box where everyone can put money in and get more out. Many people get that far in their thinking, realise cryptocurrency is a bad investment, and leave it there.

The S&P 500 would argue otherwise

Right, 500 of the largest public companies in the largest economy, is equivalent to a magic money box. It's not like they collectively have hundreds of billions in revenue or anything.

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#88
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> [...] what changes should we expect to see in the short term? The article mentions that since the company definitively sold unregistered securities to hedge funds and sophisticated buyers (without registering with the SEC), a jury will now/soon need to "decide whether or not Garlinghouse or Larson aided in the company's violation of the law." Seems pretty clear cut that the company, and it's executives, will have…

This part I don't understand, aren't those institutions "accredited investors"?

As usual, Matt Levine has a great article[1] on this topic.

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-07-14/ripple...

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#89
post #74
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> '''Having considered the economic reality of the Programmatic Sales, the Court concludes that the undisputed record does not establish the third Howey prong. Whereas the Institutional Buyers reasonably expected that Ripple would use the capital it received from its sales to improve the XRP ecosystem and thereby increase the price of XRP, Programmatic Buyers could not reasonably expect the same.''' I don't get this…

Different counterparties. If I buy XRP from you, it’s absurd for me to believe Ripple will use the money I just gave you to improve the XRP ecosystem.

So what if Ripple listed the XRP for sale through the orderbook?

Re: Ripple notches win in SEC case over XRP cryptocurrency

#90
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The unelected bureaucrats are authorized by duly elected politicians. They do not coalesce in office from the ether, they're put there by elected officials. It's not like there's no oversight.

Um, the judge just ruled that they are NOT authorised by duly elected officials in this case. That's sort of the point of the case...

I wasn't responding to this specific case, I was talking about the common "unelected bureaucrat" trope that falsely represents that gov't agencies are somehow "bad" because they're not directly run by politicians.
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