Foreign regulators refuse to help the SEC in Ripple case

Foreign regulators rejected the SEC’s requests for information regarding Ripple’s operations. The agency sent the inquiries after the company failed to provide documents on transfers of XRP tokens abroad, according to the letter.

The SEC analyzed wallet addresses linked to Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse and co-founder Chris Larsen. The commission found that hundreds of millions of XRP tokens were transferred to accounts on cryptocurrency exchanges not registered in the United States.

The SEC contacted nine foreign regulators seeking documents from 14 trading venues and five companies. Two agencies declined to assist U.S. authorities, three forbade disclosing details of the discussions. The rest rejected the request.

On April 23, SEC official Jorge Tenreiro asked Judge Sara Netburn to deny the defendants’ motion to withdraw the requests to foreign regulators.

“There is no reason to obstruct the development of a full factual record. The defendants’ request should be denied,” the document states.

In December 2020 the SEC charged Ripple with selling unregistered securities in the form of XRP tokens totaling $1.3 billion. Defendants also included Garlinghouse and Larsen. The regulator focused on their actions in the amended version of the complaint filed in February.

On April 7, Netburn granted Ripple’s motion regarding access to SEC documents revealing the regulator’s “interpretation and views” on Bitcoin and Ethereum. Against this background, the price of XRP reached the $1.8 mark.

Earlier, on April 11, 2021, the court rejected the SEC’s request to disclose the personal financial statements of the company’s top executives.

gov.uscourts.nysd.551082.136.0 by ForkLog on Scribd