Judge drops the hammer, forces Ripple to hand over all financial records

In the newest turn of events in connection with the years-long court standoff between the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Ripple, Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn has approved in full the regulator’s motion to compel the blockchain company to hand over its financial records.

Indeed, Judge Netburn has granted the SEC’s motion forcing Ripple to open its 2022-2023 books and produce the post-complaint contracts on institutional XRP sales, as per a court document shared by defense attorney and former federal prosecutor James K. Filan on February 5.

Furthermore, the Court has approved the part of the regulatory agency’s request that pertains to answering an interrogatory regarding the amount of proceeds from the institutional sales of XRP that Ripple received after the SEC filed the complaint, ordering the cryptocurrency firm to respond to it.

As a reminder, Ripple earlier filed a response to the SEC’s motion to compel, referring to the request for its financial records in the remedies discovery process as untimely and irrelevant, while legal expert Bill Morgan accused the SEC of misleading the Court, which “is happening far too often.”

Decision’s effects

Commenting on the recent decision, Morgan said it did not surprise him and that “quite frankly, I think the XRP community wants to see the Ripple post-complaint contracts,” adding that, regardless, the penalty for Ripple would be less than what the company has paid in legal costs. On the other hand, he argues:

“It has more bearing on whether a permanent injunction will be granted and, if so, and how broadly or narrowly it will be confined.”

Asked by X user Norm Mccord on the new timeframe for this legal battle to finally conclude, the lawyer referred to it as the “forever litigation,” voicing his opinion that “it’s not about the law,” but that the SEC was waging a “lawfare” or a  “deliberate long-term campaign to stymie or destroy Ripple.”

Meanwhile, XRP was at press time trading at the price of $0.503, recording a 0.65% drop on the day, in addition to declining 5.97% across the past week and losing 11.24% to its value over the last month, as per the most recent data retrieved by Finbold on February 6.

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