Crypto coins rose as digital-asset enthusiasts hailed a federal judge’s decision in the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s lawsuit against Ripple Labs Inc. as a victory for the industry when it comes to what constitutes a security. Today, the broader crypto market is showing green almost across the board.
Crypto markets turn green
XRP, the coin at the heart of the controversy, has risen by up close to 90% to 87 cents. Other tokens that have lately been labelled as unregistered securities by the SEC, such as Solana and Cardano, have also surged, scaling by approximately 16% and 18%, respectively. Bitcoin increased by nearly 4% to $31,600.
On Thursday, US District Judge Analisa Torres in New York ruled that the crypto firm’s sales of the XRP coin to competent investors fulfilled the federal securities law standard for an investment contract.
Institutional buyers would have understood that Ripple was pitching a speculative value proposition for XRP with potential profits to be derived from Ripple’s entrepreneurial and managerial efforts.
Judge Torres
However, Torres ruled that this did not apply to programmatic investors or the general public. She stated that there was no evidence that such investors could decipher Ripple’s multiple XRP-related statements. The judge stated that many of the SEC’s cited statements may not have been shared with the general public.
The shares of Coinbase Global Inc., the largest crypto exchange in the United States, rose as much as 18% to $101.31. The exchange is involved in a legal proceeding with the SEC over allegations that it sold unregistered securities.
SOL, MATIC, and ADA tokens have gained the most. In the afternoon trading, Solana’s (SOL), Polygon’s (MATIC), and Cardano’s (ADA) shares are all up by roughly 15%.
Ethereum hits $2,000
The court ruling has pushed Ethereum, the second-largest crypto by market cap, above $2,000 for the first time in more than two months.
According to CoinGecko data, Ethereum traded as high as $2,009 this afternoon, but has since fallen slightly to a current price of $1,993 as of this writing. This represents an increase of 6% in the last 24 hours and a 14% increase in the last month.
According to CoinGecko, the last time Ethereum traded above $2,000 was on May 5. In April, Ethereum momentarily surpassed $2,100, but other than those two brief periods, ETH has remained below $2,000 for the past 11 months.
Despite today’s increase, Ethereum’s price remains 59% below its November 2021 market-peak high of $4,878.
Ethereum is not the only crypto or token to benefit from the momentum generated by the XRP ruling, which has propelled XRP’s price by 81% in the last twenty-four hours.
According to CoinGecko, the entire crypto market is up approximately 5% over the past 24 hours. According to CoinGecko, the global crypto market cap is currently $1.3 Trillion, representing a 6.36 percent change over the past 24 hours and a 40.6 percent change over the past year.
The current market cap of Bitcoin (BTC) is $614 billion, representing a Bitcoin dominance of 47.27 percent. The market cap of Stablecoins is $128 billion and represents 9.83% of the total crypto market cap.
The US dollar index (DXY) keeps on falling
The weakening of the U.S. dollar index (DXY) is an additional sign of strength for crypto market prices. Historically, when the DXY index declines, sentiment towards risk assets such as Bitcoin rises.
After CPI data revealed the smallest 12-month increase since March 2021, it is possible that the DXY will continue to decline. In a perfect world, investors would view a weakening DXY as a reason to acquire riskier assets such as cryptocurrencies.
DXY’s decline has paralleled the return to form of Bitcoin and alternative cryptocurrencies. Historically, the Bitcoin price and crypto markets move in the opposite direction when the DXY weakens.
Previous speculations regarding the potential approval of the first Bitcoin ETF in the U.S. aided the crypto market. However, the optimism had diminished somewhat since the flurry of filings in early July. Some analysts believe that Chairman Gary Gensler may find it more difficult to reject the current round of Bitcoin ETF applications in light of Ripple Labs’ recent victory against the SEC.
