Ripple Labs, the creator of the self-named Ripple cryptocoin or XRP, gained a landslide victory in the US today. The presiding judge from the Southern District of New York ruled that the the company did not violate federal securities law by selling tokens of the cryptocurrency in the country’s public exchange, despite what the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) accused.
As a direct result of the ruling, the value of XRP soared within the past 24 hours, going from an average value of RM2.18 to RM3.81 at its peak. As of this publication, the average value of the coin appears to have stabilised between RM3.50 and RM3.58 per coin.
The legal battle between the SEC and XRP is considered the first major win for the cryptocurrency industry in the US, as well as the world stage. Coinbase, the largest crypto exchange in the US, announced that it would relist the coin on its platform once more, given the news. “We’ve read Judge Torres’ thoughtful decision. We’ve carefully reviewed our analysis. It’s time to relist,” Coinbase chief legal officer Paul Grewal said on Twitter.
The whole drama for XRP began when the SEC accused the coin’s parent company and its current and former chief executives of selling US$1.3 billion (~RM5.88 billion) worth of the token, as unregistered securities.
In spite of the landslide ruling, it wasn’t a complete victory for Ripple Labs and XRP. The judge threw a bone to the SEC, saying that Ripple did violate securities laws, when it sold XRP to institutional investors like “sophisticated hedge funds”.
