Ripple Legal Rumble: Defying SEC's Call For Financials

Attorneys representing Ripple Labs contend that the United States Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) plea to review supplementary financial documents lacks validity. They assert that the deadline has elapsed and that the materials are unrelated to the impending trial scheduled for April.

In a legal document filed on Jan 19, Ripple legal representatives asserted that the SEC had altered its position regarding the acquisition of further information during the discovery phase. This phase mandates each party to disclose pertinent documents to the other as part of the legal proceedings.

The SEC requested audited financial reports from Ripple for 2022 and 2023 on Jan 11. They also asked for details on any XRP sales or transfers to third-party contracts started after this. Plus, Ripple had to spill the beans about their XRP institutional sale profits. After this, XRP’s value fell, ending at $0.55.

Nevertheless, the period for requesting materials during the fact discovery phase concluded in Aug 2021. Ripple contended that the SEC had sufficient opportunities to request any necessary material during that time.

Ripple Legal Stand: SEC Challenges

At the same time, Ripple’s legal team emphasized that the court should not be influenced by the depiction of the blockchain payments technology company presented by the U.S. regulator.

The Court ought to avoid descending the treacherous path laid out by the SEC,” asserted the attorneys. Additionally, Ripple’s legal team argued that the SEC had exhausted its allotment of interrogatories, comprising a set of written questions the SEC could pose to Ripple prior to the trial.

Finally, regarding the SEC’s specific interrogatory, the filing asserts that the SEC has exhausted all its interrogatories in the case and lacks the authority to unilaterally issue additional ones.

In July 2023, Ripple did, however, win a partial success over the SEC when the judge decided that, in terms of programmatic sales on cryptocurrency exchanges, the XRP token is not a security.

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