PANews reported on October 18 that according to Bitcoin.com, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has formally appealed its ruling on the lawsuit with Ripple regarding XRP. On Thursday, the regulator filed Form C with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. In this case, the SEC is the plaintiff and appellant, and the defendants are Ripple Labs Inc. and its senior executives Brad Garlinghouse and Chris Larsen. The SEC's initial lawsuit accused Ripple and its leaders of offering and selling XRP without the necessary registration, in violation of the relevant provisions of the 1933 (Securities Act). In the appeal, the SEC objected to several important rulings. It questioned the court's conclusion that the XRP sold by Ripple on the digital asset platform was not an unregistered security, and the decision that Garlinghouse and Larsen's personal sales did not violate the Securities Act. The SEC also objected to the ruling that Ripple's non-cash XRP distribution in exchange for services did not violate the 1933 (Securities Act).
On July 13, 2023, Ripple won a partial victory when the court ruled that XRP sales on digital trading platforms were not considered securities. However, the court determined that XRP sold by Ripple to institutional investors were unregistered securities. In addition, the court ruled that Garlinghouse and Larsen's personal XRP sales did not constitute illegal behavior. On August 7 of this year, the court issued a final judgment requiring Ripple to pay a civil penalty of $125 million and prohibiting the company from violating (Securities Laws) again.
