Ripple closes chapter on XRP lawsuit with SEC

NEWS IN BRIEF

Ripple drops its cross-appeal, ending years-long legal dispute with the SEC
Court maintains $125M penalty and refuses to lift permanent injunction
Initial 2020 lawsuit alleged $1.3B in illegal XRP sales as unregistered securities

Ripple Labs formally ended its legal battle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), withdrawing its cross-appeal in a move that could mark the conclusion of a nearly four-year courtroom saga over the status of its digital asset, XRP.

“We’re closing this chapter once and for all,” Ripple Labs CEO Brad Garlinghouse said in an X post on June 27, adding that the SEC was also expected to drop its appeal. Judge Torres denied a joint settlement request that would have reduced Ripple’s civil penalty to $50 million and dissolved a court-ordered permanent injunction.

Ripple is dropping our cross appeal, and the SEC is expected to drop their appeal, as they’ve previously said. We’re closing this chapter once and for all, and focusing on what’s most important – building the Internet of Value. Lock in. https://t.co/ZsRgDfcpLh

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— Brad Garlinghouse (@bgarlinghouse) June 27, 2025

The judge said that the earlier injunction was imposed due to a reasonable probability that Ripple might continue violating federal securities laws, a concern that remains unchanged.

This was the second failed attempt to reach a more lenient settlement. With the court unwilling to revise its terms, Ripple’s decision to withdraw its appeal effectively means acceptance of a $125 million civil fine and the continued enforcement of the injunction.

Following the news, XRP saw a modest 1.4% uptick in trading.

A case that shaped crypto regulation

The legal standoff between Ripple Labs and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) began in December 2020, sending shockwaves across the cryptocurrency industry. The SEC, under then-chair Jay Clayton, accused Ripple and its executives including CEO Brad Garlinghouse and co-founder Chris Larsen of raising $1.3 billion through the sale of XRP, which the agency classified as an unregistered security.

Ripple, however, maintained that XRP was not a security but a digital currency built for cross-border payments. Its utility, the company argued, lay in its role as a bridge currency facilitating real-time, low-cost international transactions, not as an investment promising returns based on Ripple’s performance.

At the time, XRP was the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization. The lawsuit not only cast a shadow over Ripple’s operations but also prompted intense debate over how digital assets should be classified under U.S. law.

In a partial win for Ripple, U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres ruled in 2023 that XRP sales to retail investors on public exchanges did not constitute securities transactions. However, she found that XRP sales to institutional investors did violate federal securities laws, upholding part of the SEC’s complaint.