the judge in the Ripple case rejected the SEC’s decision to appeal the recent Ripple victory.
The decision was made by Judge Analisa Torres on October 3, 2023.
The SEC’s request for a postponement was also denied as moot. The hearing will begin at 9:00 on April 23, 2024.
The court established various deadlines in its pretrial scheduling order:
Parties must submit all required pretrial filings, including the joint pretrial order, charging motions, decision form, and voir dire questions, by December 4, 2023.
The parties must have submitted a copy of each document requested to be accepted to the court by December 4, 2023.
On April 16, 2024, at 2:00 p.m., attorneys for all parties must appear for a final pretrial conference.
This decision marks a significant victory for Ripple in its ongoing legal battle with the SEC.
So what does this development mean? And in summary, what happened before:
The SEC was seeking to appeal the lower court’s ruling that XRP secondary sales were not securities offerings and therefore did not violate Howey.
The SEC wanted to file an interlocutory appeal, which is an appeal in the middle of the case (normally no appeals are filed until all issues are finally decided, but there are exceptions for very important issues). You need permission from the court for this type of appeal.
The court has now rejected this appeal. He basically just said “this issue is not important enough to give you an exception.”
The court’s response to the SEC could be said to be that you need a hearing (or possibly some motions) and then you can appeal.
The summary of the court’s reasoning is as follows:
1- This is not a pure matter of law, but a fact-specific application of the Howey test. Not eligible for immediate appeal.
2- These are not issues that control the law just because they can set a precedent. This case involves unique facts and circumstances and therefore has limited precedential value. This is actually not very good, let’s remember that this case is pro-cryptocurrency and people want to use it for the Howey test and a general statement about crypto. The court disagrees.
3- The recent LUNA case in New York was cited by the SEC as a decision that disagreed with this district court decision, especially since the NY court clearly referred to this Ripple case and disagreed with it, so it was used by the SEC. The court rejected this as a ground for disagreement because the two courts disagreed on their reasoning (as these were fact-specific cases).
4- According to the court, the interlocutory appeal will not significantly advance this case because this case is very specific.
Conclusion: The court simply says that the SEC should wait its turn to appeal these issues, the court’s decision is fact-specific and limited to this case only, with no precedent to be cited.
