SEC Agrees to Dismiss Coinbase Case. Is Ripple Next?

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has agreed in principle to dismiss the Coinbase case.

“After years of litigation, millions of your taxpayer dollars spent, and irreparable harm done to the country, we reached an agreement with SEC staff to dismiss their litigation against Coinbase,” Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said in a statement. 

According to Armstrong, this is expected to be a “full dismissal” with zero fines and charges. 

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The Coinbase boss says that he feels vindicated after many people questioned his decision to engage in litigation after the SEC initially took the leading US exchange to court back in 2023. However, Armstrong believes that caving to the regulator’s demands could have “killed” the industry. “And if we had caved, it would have dramatically limited the scope of which crypto assets were allowed in the US, and pushed the industry further offshore, into the shadows,” he added.

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Armstrong now says that fighting the SEC was the “right thing to do” for Coinbase’s customers as well as the broader industry.    

“Total victory” 

Legal analyst Jake Chervinsky described the outcome as a “total victory” for Coinbase. “The agencies almost never walk away from litigation without at least extracting a face-saving settlement,” he said. 

The shares of COIN are up by more than 4% in pre-market trading. Bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency, has reclaimed the $99,000 level. 

Meanwhile, John Reed Stark, a former SEC official, recently predicted that the agency’s appeal against Ripple could be next in line for dismissal.