XRP vs. SEC Endgame: Joint Summary Judgment Proposal Filed

• Ripple and the SEC filed a joint proposal to govern sealing issues.
• The proposal is for the forthcoming summary judgment on the XRP lawsuit.
• Sep 19 will show most of the cards that both parties are holding up their sleeves.

The “endgame” of the long-running lawsuit battle between the distributed ledger technology firm Ripple and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is nearing, as they confirmed a joint proposal to govern sealing issues, filed on September 9.

Defendants of both parties submitted the joint proposal for the forthcoming summary judgment in the Ripple (XRP) dispute. Neither party wants the court to lift the seal on motions that are yet to be filed.

The proposal requests comprehensive public access to the parties’ briefs in the XRP lawsuit. It did, however, state that any recommended redactions are likely to be minimal. Defense lawyer, James K. Filan, shared the detailed proposal letter on Twitter.

To ensure efficiency, both parties agreed to provide a redaction schedule at the earliest, which is anticipated to be shortly after the reply briefs are submitted. The letter further states that this will allow both parties to meet and confer on various issues in the XRP case.

According to the letter, the plan stretches from September 13 to December 22, 2022. In the beginning, parties must file their summary judgment motion filings under seal. Eventually, this will include statements, briefs, supporting documents, and exhibits.

On September 15, XRP defendants will have a meeting with the SEC to confer, and this conference will identify redactions sought by both the briefs in the lawsuit to strengthen the summary judgment requests. However, it remains to be seen whether this approach will address the Hinman documents’ concerns.

Meanwhile, crypto legal expert Jeremy Hogan chimed in about marking the calendar for September 19, since on that day minimally redacted copies of the briefs in support of the summary judgment motions will be filed publicly. “Ripple v. SEC—The endgame. It’s getting me excited,” he quipped in his Twitter post.

XRP published a post on their website about this joint proposal to update their community about the specifics of the schedule. Therein, XRP recalled the last two years of this lawsuit and mentioned, “It has been quite the rollercoaster fighting the Securities and Exchange Commission, but we will come out on top of this war against this agency that is full of nothing but overreaching regulation and misconduct.”