Another civil securities lawsuit has been filed against Ripple Labs in the US, though not by a government agency. A person named Bradley Sostack stated that Garlinghouse sold millions of tokens after Garlinghouse said in an interview in 2017, “I’m looking long, long term for XRP,” and filed a lawsuit.

The request for this lawsuit against Ripple and CEO Garlinghouse to proceed in the form of a summary judgment was rejected yesterday by Judge Phyllis Hamilton. This will initiate a court, that is, a trial process.

Why is the securities issue back on the agenda?

Plaintiff Bradley Sostack claims that Garlinghouse’s statements misled investors and that Garlinghouse actually violated securities laws. The court’s decision on whether XRP is a security will have important legal implications. If the court decides that XRP’s sales to small investors are sales of securities, then Brad Garlinghouse may be found to have violated securities laws. If XRP is not recognized as a security, some of the claims based on securities laws may be dropped.

In the Ripple-SEC case, U.S. District Court Judge Analisa Torres ruled that retail sales of XRP are not securities sales, but sales to institutional investors are. The decision was described as a partial victory by the crypto world.

Although courts in different regions in the US take each other’s decisions into account, they do not have to make the same decision.

Despite the judge’s ruling, there was no sharp drop in the XRP price. XRP is trading at $0.50 at the time of writing.