According to Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will withdraw its appeal against Ripple, marking the latest in a series of enforcement actions abandoned since the early days of President Donald Trump’s administration.
Garlinghouse stated in an interview with Bloomberg on Wednesday: “This gives Ripple a great deal of certainty.” He estimated that the company has spent over $150 million defending itself. However, some litigation between Ripple and the SEC is still ongoing.
The SEC sued Ripple in December 2020, claiming that the company violated the law by raising funds through the sale of the token XRP without registering it as a security. In 2023, U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres ruled that XRP is only subject to securities laws when sold to institutional investors, a decision that was viewed as a significant victory for the cryptocurrency sector at the time.
The SEC appealed this ruling last year, initially seeking a $2 billion fine from Ripple, but the court ultimately imposed only a $125 million civil penalty. Ripple’s Chief Legal Officer Stuart Alderoty recently stated that Ripple is still considering whether to continue the appeal or pay the fine.
Optimism for XRP to be included in the “U.S. Digital Assets Stockpile”
Trump indicated in February that the U.S. government is pushing for a cryptocurrency strategic reserve, specifically naming Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), SOL, ADA, and XRP for inclusion. However, when Trump signed an executive order regarding the digital assets strategic reserve last month, XRP was not mentioned.
In response, Garlinghouse stated during the interview that the executive order not only directs the establishment of a “Digital Assets Stockpile” for the U.S. but that he expects XRP to be included in it.
Moreover, Garlinghouse believes that applications for an XRP spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) will be approved by the SEC in the latter half of this year, mentioning that several asset management companies, including Bitwise, have submitted related applications. According to previous reports from Zombit, the SEC announced last week that it would postpone applications for various altcoin ETFs, including Solana, Litecoin, XRP, and DOGE.
When asked if Ripple would apply for an IPO, Garlinghouse stated that an IPO application is not currently a priority for Ripple, as the company is focused on acquisition plans and “will look at other blockchain infrastructure companies.”
Garlinghouse also mentioned Ripple’s stablecoin, Ripple USD (RLUSD), which was launched at the end of last year. He believes that the stablecoin market will grow significantly this year, and since the current scale of RLUSD is still small, their goal is for the token to become one of the top five stablecoins by market capitalization by the end of this year.
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