Coinbase said Friday that the SEC agreed to stop litigation against the company due to bias. In other words, he said he could not submit it again.
The move, subject to approval from the SEC commissioner, is another signal that the Trump administration plans to be more code-friendly than it had been under former leader Gary Gensler.
The SEC lawsuit filed in 2023 claimed that the crypto assets were securities and that Coinbase operates as “an unregistered national stock exchange, broker and liquidation agency.”
Coinbase fought back to sue them by claiming that the SEC has not established sufficient clear rules regarding Crypto.
“I remember a lot of people advised this in 2023. They said, “Don’t engage in lawsuits with the SEC. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said in a video he posted on X on Friday that the suit had been dropped. In the video, Armstrong also argued about the SEC’s motivations and tactics.
Armstrong said he fought because he believed he was saving the American crypto industry.
“Not many other companies had as deep pockets as we did,” he said. “And in the end we had to spend $50 million to defend this case” – opposition proved right about how expensive the fight could be.
A spokesman for Coinbase revealed that this amount includes strict external legal fees, not employee time.
Aside from Coinbase’s apparent legal victory, Armstrong said he believes the US is at risk of “acquiring encrypted laws” to codify favorable regulations, or falling behind other countries.
