Ripple CEO lashes out at SEC boss Gary Gensler

Ripple Labs and the U.S. SEC have been in a legal battle for years. Now Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of Ripple, apparently feels challenged by a new statement from SEC boss Gary Gensler.

Speaking at the Bloomberg Invest Summit, Gensler said of the crypto sector, "This is an area where the leaders of a few years ago are now in jail, about to go to jail or waiting to be extradited." This infuriated the Ripple CEO. In a post on X, he called Gensler's statements "complete nonsense" and accused the SEC boss, among other things, of failing to prevent the collapse of FTX.

Garlinghouse goes even further, writing, "If he (Gensler) really worked 'for the American people,' as he says, he would have been fired long ago. Gensler will make sure Biden loses the election." Recently, crypto has become a theme in both parties' election campaigns, with Republican challenger Donald Trump portraying himself as a crypto advocate.

In July 2023, Ripple scored a partial victory in its lawsuit with the SEC, as Judge Torres ruled that XRP is not a security when trading with retail investors. However, when sold to institutional investors, XRP must be considered a security. Therefore, the SEC proposed fines of nearly $2 billion and recently rejected a compromise proposal from Ripple.

It seems that Ripple Labs and the SEC will never be friends. However, Ripple Labs can be successful in the long run even without the adoption of XRP.