Ripple lawsuit: Former SEC official finds court ruling ‘ripe for appeal’

• Former SEC official criticized the distinction made between institutional investors and the general public.
• At press time, XRP was 50% higher than it was a month ago.

XRP scored high on the popularity charts after securing a victory in one of the longest and most hotly contested legal battles in corporate history. As per social analytics firm LunarCrush, the payments-focused crypto’s social buzz has soared following the landmark judgement.

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In terms of social engagements, the coin outperformed other major assets such as Ethereum [ETH], trailing only Bitcoin [BTC].

Prices have significantly cooled down after exploding by 80% on the day of the verdict. Despite this, XRP is still 50% higher than it was a month ago, trading at $0.71 at the time of writing, according to CoinMarketCap

Too early to celebrate?

While XRP community and most proponents of cryptos were in celebratory mode, voices criticizing the ruling began to emerge.

John Reed Stark, ex-official at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), voiced his concerns and took to LinkedIn to point out fundamental flaws with the verdict. Mincing no words, the former executive said,

“The decision resides on shaky ground, is likely (and ripe) for appeal, will likely result in reversal and is not necessarily a cause for celebration.”

Stark raised objections to the distinction made between institutional investors and retail investors when it came to extending SEC protections and remedies. For context, the ruling had mentioned that XRP is a security when it’s sold to institutional investors but not to the general public.

Secondly, he questioned the logic behind exempting token sales through exchanges from securities law. The assumption that retail buyers were ignorant and didn’t know anything about the crypto-issuer was “not only patronizing but just plain insulting”, as per Stark.

How many are 1,10,100 XRPs worth today

Furthermore, he disputed the notion that retail investors could not have known about Ripple’s intentions. The official argued that they had access to the same information as institutional investors. The former SEC official said that retail investors placed their bets on XRP because they knew it was backed by Ripple.

It remains to be seen what will be the next plan of action adopted by SEC. As per an earlier report by Bloomberg, the regulator was reviewing the ruling.