XRP Case Hero? Ripple CEO Praises Lawyer Who Beat SEC

Brad Garlinghouse, the CEO of Ripple, took a moment today to publicly recognize Stuart Alderoty, the company’s chief legal officer, for his role in providing the company with effective leadership and for his contributions to the crypto industry as a whole.

Through a social media post, Garlinghouse spotlighted a recent National Law Review profile outlining Alderoty’s pivotal role in one of the most important court decisions in the crypto industry thus far - the so-called XRP case.

The article details Ripple’s legal battle with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which began in late 2020. Central to the case was the SEC’s claim that Ripple’s sales of XRP constituted unregistered securities offerings - a ruling that would have granted the agency far-reaching control over digital assets on the U.S. market.

Just before the lawsuit, Alderoty joined Ripple and was tasked with leading the company’s defense. A key part of the strategy was pushing back against the idea that the XRP token itself could be treated as a security, in particular in secondary market trades.

It took more than three years of litigation to reach the ruling handed down in mid-2023. XRP was confirmed not to be a security by itself, which set a strong precedent across the industry and seriously limited the SEC’s ability to act.

Legal fees for the case cost Ripple more than $150 million, but the case clearly shifted how crypto regulation is approached.

Just as Ripple is moving forward, so is Alderoty. In fact, earlier this year, he took on a new role as president of the National Cryptocurrency Association, a group dedicated to rebuilding the public conversation around cryptocurrency.