The nonprofit Blockchain Association has backed Ripple in its lawsuit against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
1/ Today we announced we filed an amicus brief supporting a correct interpretation of Howey in the SEC’s two-year legal battle against @Ripple.
A judge now has the opportunity to issue a substantive opinion on how Howey applies to digital assets.
Here’s what’s at stake🧵🧵🧵
— Blockchain Association (@BlockchainAssn) October 28, 2022
The lobbying group filed a brief with the court as an amicus curiae — ‘friend of the court’.
In December 2020 the SEC brought charges against the fintech company, its co-founder Chris Larsen and CEO Brad Garlinghouse for selling unregistered securities in the form of the XRP token.
According to the Blockchain Association, the court is nearing a decision in the case. The group fears that it will be decided in the regulator’s favour. In such a scenario, the list of crypto assets that fall under the definition of securities would broaden, ‘contrary to the intent of the Supreme Court in the Howey case,’ experts say.
“An expansive, inconsistent reading of the SEC’s securities laws is currently the greatest threat to the future of this fast-growing industry. By applying outdated standards haphazardly to modern and innovative technologies, the Commission continues its ‘regulation through enforcement’ model, punishing crypto companies without good cause or warning,” said Christine Smith, CEO of the Blockchain Association.
In her view, a Ripple-favouring court decision would ‘open the door to modernised standards for the industry’.
Earlier, in the role of amicus curiae, Blockchain Association also backed Grayscale Investments in the case against the SEC.
Earlier, LBRY CEO Jeremy Kaufman said regulators intended ‘to harm or destroy the cryptocurrency industry in the United States’.
Prior to this, the Commission came under criticism from billionaire Mark Cuban, and Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse rebuked the agency for using a coercive approach rather than working on clear rules.
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