While the case of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) against Ripple Labs continues to await the decision of the responsible judge in the Southern District Court of New York, the fintech company may have received a winning argument from the judge in the Voyager case.
Bankrupt crypto lender Voyager Digital recently received approval from bankruptcy judge Michael Wiles over the decision to sell assets and transfer customers to Binance.US (although the Department of Justice vetoed the decision). In his ruling, Wiles addressed the ambiguous legal situation for the crypto industry with strong words.
Paul Grewal, Chief Legal Officer (CLO) at Coinbase, recommended via Twitter that everyone should read the verdict, specifically showing the passage that states:
Regulators themselves can’t agree on whether cryptocurrencies are commodities that can be regulated by the CFTC, or whether they are securities. […] subject to securities laws, or not, or even in what criteria should be applied to make a decision.
This uncertainty persists despite the fact that cryptocurrency exchanges have been around for years.
According to Jeremy Hogan, a popular lawyer in the XRP community, this word could be a winning argument based on the “fair notice” defense for Ripple in its case against the SEC. The fair notice defense derives from the Due Process Clause of the US Constitution and requires that the wording of a criminal statute be clear enough to objectively indicate what is prohibited.
Jeremy Hogan my opinion“Look for Ripple to file a Voyager judge’s bankruptcy decision to support the fair notice defense. It’s good to see the judge express the problems facing crypto projects.
Not Just Ripple
In recent days and weeks, the US government’s “Operation Choke Point” against the crypto industry has become increasingly visible. And that pressure will continue to grow. As XRP community lawyer John E. Deaton explains, the SEC plans to expand its enforcement actions to more than 100.
The attorney also referenced a recent tweet from FOX Business reporter Eleanor Terrett, who reported that Gary Gensler is increasing his crypto enforcement staff, even though he doubled his staff responsible for crypto a year ago.
Because of this, the lawyers representing the XRP community in the Ripple case launched an initiative to gather industry resources against the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
“I’m trying to bring together a group of companies/people that the SEC claims are in violation of Section 5 of the Securities Act for issuing, offering or selling tokens that the SEC claims meet the Howey test,” Deaton said. write on Twitter today.
According to the lawyer, it would be helpful if the defense team in the case of Ripple and LBRY had communicated with each other. “There is a coordinated anti-crypto effort underway. It’s time we coordinated as well,” Deaton concluded.
At press time, the price of XRP was trading at $0.3638, continuing a downward trend that has been ongoing since late January.
Option images from Louis Hansel, charts from TradingView.com