Ripple CEO: XRP Lawsuit Resolved by June, SEC Conduct ‘Embarrassing’

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said the firm’s XRP lawsuit could come to an end inside “single-digit months.”

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse expects the firm’s lengthy running question with the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) will be concluded inside “single-digit months” and stays confident in getting a positive outcome.

Addressing CNBC on Jan. 18 at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Garlinghouse said the that decision could come as soon as June now that the two players have “fully filled and fully briefed” their contentions before the U.S. District Court:

“An adjudicator is expected to make a decision in 2023.You don’t actually have control over when an adjudicator settles on their choices. However, I’m hopeful that sometime in the coming single digit months we’ll have closure there.”

While Garlinghouse and investors accept that the facts, regulation and the court will ultimately agree with Ripple, the Ripple CEO also took the opportunity to deride the SEC’s “embarrassing” behavior showed all through the lawsuit, taking note of:

“The SEC’s behavior in some of it has been embarrassing as a U.S. resident. Only some of the things that have been occurring, similar to you must kidding .”

Garlinghouse also argued the firm was betrayed by the regulator, as it filed the lawsuit regardless of their efforts to meet with them on three separate occasions looking for regulatory lucidity:

“Not once did they tell me about the possibility of XRP being a security. So to later return and say hello the entire time we thought XRP was a security we simply didn’t tell you… that doesn’t feel like a certifiable partnership between public sector and private sector.”

While taking note of that the outcome of the case also has immense implications for the cryptocurrency industry, Garlinghouse reiterated that Ripple would possibly settle if it was clarified that XRP isn’t a security.

However, “The SEC and Gary Gensler has outwardly said he sees practically all crypto as a security,” Garlinghouse said, “so that leaves next to no space in the Venn diagram for settlement.”
Garlinghouse added that the SEC should take note of some of the more Crypto-accommodating countries that are sorting out more “positive” regulation that doesn’t stifle innovation.

Among the countries that he praises were the United Arab Emirates, Japan, Singapore, Switzerland and the U.K.
The SEC filed the lawsuit in December 2020, alleging that Ripple illegally sold its XRP token as an unregistered security.

Ripple has long questioned the case, contending that it doesn’t constitute an investment contract under the Howey test.

Should the different sides fail to settle, the New York-based district court will either make an independent decision or put the matter before a jury in a trial.