Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse stated that the company’s XRP litigation could be resolved in “single-digit months.”
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse believes the company’s long-running disagreement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will be resolved in “single-digit months” and is certain of a good resolution.
Garlinghouse told CNBC on January 18 at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that the judgement might come as soon as June now that both sides have “completely filed and properly prepared” their positions before the US District Court:
“We expect a decision from a judge certainly in 2023. You don’t really have control over when a judge makes their decisions. But I’m optimistic that sometime in the coming single digit months we’ll have closure there.”
While Garlinghouse and investors think that the facts, law, and the court would ultimately rule in Ripple’s favour, the Ripple CEO also used the occasion to mock the SEC’s “embarrassing” approach during the lawsuit, noting:
“The SEC’s behavior in some of it has been embarrassing as a U.S. citizen. Just some of the things that have been happening, like you’ve got to be kidding.”
Garlinghouse also argued the firm was betrayed by the regulator, as it filed the lawsuit despite their efforts to meet with them on three separate occasions seeking regulatory clarity:
“Not once did they say to me that we think XRP may be a security. So to later go back and say, hey the whole time we thought XRP was a security, we just didn’t tell you that it doesn’t feel like a genuine partnership between the public sector and private sector.”
While acknowledging that the outcome of the case will have far-reaching consequences for the cryptocurrency sector, Garlinghouse underlined that Ripple would only settle if it was made clear that XRP is not a securities.
However, “the SEC and Gary Gensler has very openly stated that he regards practically everything crypto as a security,” according to Garlinghouse, “so that leaves very little space in the Venn diagram for settlement.”
The SEC, according to Garlinghouse, should take heed of some of the more crypto-friendly countries that are stitching together more “positive” regulation that does not restrict innovation.
Among the countries he praised were the United Arab Emirates, Japan, Singapore, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
The SEC filed the case in December 2020, alleging that Ripple improperly offered its XRP coin as an unregistered security.
Ripple has long contested the assertion, claiming that it does not meet the Howey test for an investment contract.
If the two parties cannot reach an agreement, the New York-based district court will either issue a stand-alone judgment or put the case before a jury in a trial.
