The US SEC Drops Lawsuit Against Ripple’s Executives

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has dismissed its case against two of Ripple’s executives, Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen. Brad Garlinghouse is the CEO, and Chris Larsen is the co-founder of the company.

The SEC’s decision to drop the case against Garlinghouse and Larsen was announced in an official document. Former Federal Prosecutor James K Filan shared the excerpt from the document, which read, “the claims alleged by Plaintiff Securities and Exchange Commission against Defendants Bradley Garlinghouse and Christian A. Larsen are hereby dismissed in their entirety without costs or fees.”

As a result, this means that all allegations against the two Ripple executives related to aiding Ripple’s violations of securities regulations have been dismissed by the SEC.

Stuart Alderoty, the Chief Legal Officer of Ripple, welcomed this turn of events, emphasizing that this was not a settlement but, in fact, a “surrender by the SEC.”

In addition, Alderoty said that the SEC’s decision to sue Garlinghouse and Larsen was a serious mistake, and it ultimately led to the SEC’s capitulation in the case.

He also highlighted the victories for Ripple, including the July 13th decision that ruled XRP is not a security and the October 3rd decision denying the SEC’s bid for an interlocutory appeal.

The impact of this news caused a surge in the price of XRP. The altcoin’s price experienced a growth of over 4% over the past 24 hours. According to CoinMarketCap, Ripple’s XRP was trading at $0.510 with a market cap of over $27 billion.

This dismissal is the latest in a series of legal setbacks for the SEC in its case against Ripple. The SEC initiated its lawsuit against Ripple in December 2020.