Ripple Drops Cross-Appeal, Gets $75 Million Back From SEC

The long-running legal battle between Ripple Labs and the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is slowly coming to an end, with the balance tipping in Ripple’s favor.

SEC Withholds $50 Million in Fines From Ripple

According to the latest information, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will refund $75 million of the total $125 million fine that Ripple was ordered to pay by the court last year. The settlement is still awaiting SEC approval to take effect.

The final crossing of t’s and dotting of i’s – and what should be my last update on SEC v Ripple ever…

Last week, the SEC agreed to drop its appeal without conditions. @Ripple has now agreed to drop its cross-appeal. The SEC will keep $50M of the $125M fine (already in an…

— Stuart Alderoty (@s_alderoty) March 25, 2025

In a March 25 post, Stuart Alderoty - Ripple's Chief Legal Officer - called this likely the "final update" on the four-year dispute between the two sides.

Notably, the decision was announced just a week after the SEC dropped a partial appeal of Judge Torres' previous ruling. The ruling determined that Ripple did not violate securities laws when selling XRP on exchanges, but only transactions selling XRP to institutions were considered violations.

As part of the settlement, Ripple agreed to withdraw its cross-appeal. Stuart Alderoty said the SEC will also ask the court to lift the ban on Ripple selling XRP to institutional investors.

Immediately after this information was announced, XRP's price only increased slightly by 1.5% but also quickly corrected adjusted to around $2.45, similar to the trend of Bitcoin (BTC).

Legal developments and overall impact

In December 2020, the SEC sued Ripple, alleging that XRP was a security and that Ripple violated securities laws by selling tokens without registering them.

The litigation dragged on, and in July 2023, New York Judge Analisa Torres ruled on Ripple's XRP sales as follows:

Programmatic sales of XRP (sold through a blind auction process) did not violate securities laws because the buyers did not know they were dealing with Ripple.

However, direct sales of XRP to institutional investors would be considered securities under US law.

As a result, by August 2024, Ripple was fined $125 million in connection with transactions with institutional investors. According to the latest update, as outlined above, of this fine, the SEC will retain $50 million and return $75 million to Ripple.

Without the lawsuit, Ripple would not have gone into politics

The SEC-Ripple lawsuit, filed during President Donald Trump’s first term, is one of the SEC’s longest-running legal battles against a major crypto company in the US.

Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse has stated that if the SEC had not been led by Gary Gensler, Ripple might not have gotten so deeply involved in US politics, although the lawsuit was actually initiated under former SEC Chairman Jay Clayton.

Crypto made its debut on @60Minutes tonight – there’s no doubt that these technologies will continue to become more and more mainstream - with influence and reach that will only continue to grow.

A few things I do want to comment on after watching:

I spoke with Margaret…