In criticism of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Ripple’s Chief Legal Officer Stuart Alderoty has accused the regulatory body of engaging in actions that have artificially suppressed the cryptocurrency market.
In a recent tweet, Alderoty wrote, “Turns out, the only ‘efforts of others’ that truly moved crypto markets—by causing massive and prolonged artificial suppression—were those of the SEC.”
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Ripple in December 2020, alleging that the San Francisco-based business violated the law by selling XRP without first registering it as a security.
Turns out, the only ‘efforts of others’ that truly moved crypto markets—by causing massive and prolonged artificial suppression—were those of the SEC.
— Stuart Alderoty (@s_alderoty) December 2, 2024
The agency, under Chair Gary Gensler, then filed lawsuits against several digital asset companies, including Coinbase Global and Binance Holdings.
While Bitcoin, the largest digital asset, is considered a commodity, the SEC, led by Gensler, contends that the majority of other tokens are unregistered securities that should be subject to its control. Gensler now wants to step down in January, which has contributed to XRP’s recent price increase.
Overall, digital assets flagged as “unregistered securities” in previous SEC litigation, such as ADA and SOL, have benefited from this positive sentiment.
XRP hits record inflow
The comments from Ripple’s chief legal officer come as XRP is seeing a $100 billion rise.
XRP rose to briefly become the third-largest cryptocurrency following a $100 billion rally. On Monday, the token soared by up to 20% to a nearly seven-year high of $2.50, last touched in January 2018. In the process, its market value increased to $139 billion, up from less than $30 billion on Nov. 5.
At the time of writing, XRP was up 19% in the last 24 hours to $2.28, according to CoinMarketCap data, and ranked the fourth largest cryptocurrency with a market value of $130.29 billion.
According to the most recent CoinShares report, XRP had inflows of $95 million, the highest on record, which could be attributed to the buzz around the possibility of a U.S. ETF.
In positive news, WisdomTree has formally filed an S-1 with the SEC for an XRP spot ETF, joining Bitwise, 21Shares and Canary in applying for a fund that tracks the daily price of XRP.
