The votes are in, and it’s now official that the 47th US President will be the 45th one – Donald J. Trump. Now, the crypto industry will wait to see if he will follow through on his multiple promises to let it thrive and support it in various ways.
One of those promises made during the Nashville Bitcoin Conference earlier this year involved Gary Gensler, the current Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Trump to Fire Gensler?
Recall the events that transpired in late July, when the former BTC critic took the stage on the largest US Bitcoin Conference and, among other things, said he will fire Gensler on his first day in office if he wins the elections. He was so adamant in his proclamation that he highlighted it twice after the crowd went wild with ovations.
Now that the former and future President has officially declared himself the winner, the question arises about whether Gensler will indeed be out of the job come January.
Gensler and the agency he led for several years have been at the forefront of multiple lawsuits against crypto companies. While they have lost quite a few battles or settled at best, Gensler has ultimately failed to provide clear regulation regarding digital assets and has caused confusion on which of them are actually securities.
Perhaps the most well-known tussle the SEC has been engaged in is with Ripple. It started nearly four years ago, and the Commission sued the Brad Garlinghouse-led firm, claiming that the initial XRP sales constituted unregistered securities sales worth $1.3 billion.
The case is yet to be resolved, even though there have been many developments on the matter, which you can check here and here. Nevertheless, it seems, at least in theory, that Ripple could be among the biggest beneficiaries if Gensler is no longer at the helm of the SEC in the next few months. So, what’s happening with XRP’s price?
Why No Real Pump, XRP?
Most of the market surged today following Trump’s initial lead and subsequent victory. Bitcoin registered a new all-time high above $75,000, SOL soared by 15% to surpass BNB as the fourth-largest digital asset, DOGE shot up to north of $0.2 due to its Musk affiliation, while numerous other meme coins charted double-digit increases.
At the same time, XRP is a modest 4% up on the day. At one point, it even lost its spot as the seventh-largest cryptocurrency to DOGE but has managed to reclaim it.
The reasons behind this lack of enthusiasm, to say the least, could be multi-fold. First, it will be a couple of months before Trump goes into office. Second, he would actually need to be true to his word and, indeed, fire Gensler. Third, there’s no indication of who will be the next SEC Chair, what policies they will have related to the cryptocurrency industry, and the lawsuit against Ripple, in particular.
Consequently, there’s still a lot of uncertainty regarding the current political situation and Ripple’s case against the US securities regulator. XRP bulls might have to wait a bit longer to see the conclusion of the lawsuit and what would happen to the asset’s price.
