On May 23, Coinbase’s Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal announced that New York customers could once again trade XRP on the cryptocurrency exchange after a nine-month hiatus.
In a brief social media post, Grewal provided the following update: “XRP trading on Coinbase is available again in NY. We’ve heard you and are working in strong partnership with the state. Now you can get the word out. We are the backup.”
Since the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit against Ripple in 2020, XRP (XRP) has remained a troubled asset, facing scrutiny from both government regulators and central exchanges.
A number of centralized exchanges, including Coinbase, Bittrex, and Binance.US, delisted XRP after the SEC accused Ripple Labs of selling unregistered securities.
The same exchanges reversed course and relisted the digital asset in 2023 after Judge Analisa Torres ruled that secondary sales of XRP did not constitute securities sales.
At the time, Coinbase made headlines for relisting the token as XRP investors and speculators were eagerly waiting for other large exchanges to relist the asset.
However, despite the court ruling and the token’s relisting on US platforms, XRP continues to face regulatory hurdles in some jurisdictions and regions, such as Japan and New York.
In September 2023, the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) removed Ripple Labs from its “green list” of companies authorized to store customer assets, forcing Coinbase to suspend XRP trading for New York residents.
Crypto companies and other entities seeking to act as custodians of customer funds in New York must apply to and be individually approved by NYDFS to maintain the right to act as custodian of assets in the state.
Related: XRPL on-chain transactions increase by 108% in Q1 2024
The price of XRP appears to have reacted positively to this news, putting upward pressure on the daily candle and moving the price from $0.51 to almost $0.53 at the time of this writing.
Nonetheless, the price of XRP has been suffering from a steady decline since its most recent high of $0.74, formed on March 12, 2024.