Judge Denied SEC’s Motion to Seal Documents Related to Former Division of Corporation Finance Director

A judge in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York yesterday denied the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) motion to seal documents related to a 2018 speech by former Division of Corporation Finance Director Bill Hinman which discussed why he did not consider Bitcoin and ether to be securities.

In her court order, Judge Analisa Torres ruled that the documents are “judicial documents subject to a strong presumption of public access.”

The SEC has been engaged in a long-running lawsuit with crypto firm Ripple, and the documents relate to the commission’s claims that Ripple illegally sold its XRP token without formally registering it as a security.