District Court Judge Analisa Torres has dismissed the United States Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) attempt to appeal its loss in the case against Ripple Labs, the company responsible for creating the XRP (XRP) token.
In a court order dated October 3, Judge Torres denied the SEC’s motion, stating that the regulatory body failed to demonstrate that there were significant legal questions or substantial grounds for differing opinions on the matter.
“The SEC’s motion for certification of interlocutory appeal is denied, and the SEC’s request for a stay is denied as moot.”
Importantly, this ruling does not constitute an outright defeat for the SEC, as Judge Torres has scheduled a trial for April 23, 2024, to address the remaining issues in the case.
Following this news, XRP experienced a nearly 6% price surge, as reported by TradingView data.
The price of XRP gained nearly 6% following the rejection of the SEC’s motion. Source: TradingView
Back on July 13, Judge Torres had previously ruled partially in favor of Ripple, stating that the retail sales of XRP tokens did not fit the legal definition of a security. However, the court did find that Ripple had violated securities laws by directly selling XRP tokens to institutional investors.
Subsequently, in August, the SEC moved to appeal this decision, asserting that there were significant differences of opinion regarding the applicable laws.
As of the time of publication, neither Ripple Labs nor the SEC has issued an immediate response to requests for comments from Cointelegraph.
The SEC initially filed its lawsuit against Ripple, its CEO Brad Garlinghouse, and co-founder Chris Larsen in December 2020, leading to the delisting of the XRP token by numerous exchanges to avoid potential legal repercussions. Following Judge Torres’ ruling in July, many cryptocurrency firms announced plans to relist the token or explore such possibilities in the future.
The SEC has recently focused on various cryptocurrency firms, alleging violations of securities regulations, including major cryptocurrency exchanges like Binance and Coinbase.
On August 29, asset manager Grayscale achieved a court victory against the SEC, prompting a review of its application for a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) following an appeal.