The Securities and Exchange Commission’s purge of pending lawsuits against crypto exchanges is showing no signs of stopping.
On Monday, Kraken said the SEC “agreed in principle” to dismiss its lawsuit against the crypto exchange, which is one of the largest in the world.
The move comes on the heels of last week’s news that the SEC would drop its investigations into Coinbase and Robinhood, two other major crypto exchanges with pending lawsuits.
It was widely expected that during Trump’s presidency, the SEC would take its foot off the pedal when it comes to crypto regulation. Already, the commission’s actions have marked a sharp reversal from the crypto crackdown seen during former SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s tenure.
The SEC sued Kraken in November 2023, under Gensler. As in its cases against other exchanges, at the heart of the SEC’s lawsuit was the allegation that the company acted as an unregistered broker, dealer, and exchange.
Additionally, the SEC alleged Kraken “commingles its customers’ crypto assets with its own, creating what its own auditor had identified as ‘a significant risk of loss’ to its customers.”
In a blog post announcing the dropped lawsuit, Kraken said the dismissal marked “a turning point for the future of crypto in the US.”
“It ends a wasteful, politically motivated campaign, lifts uncertainty that stifled innovation and investment, and clears the path toward a stable, forward-thinking regulatory regime,” the company said.
The SEC hasn’t commented on the Kraken dismissal.
In its confirmation of the Coinbase dismissal, the SEC stressed that it was dropping the lawsuit “given the pending work of the Crypto Task Force,” a newly assembled group responsible for developing a regulatory path for crypto assets.
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