Anger about the negative market consequences of Ripple selling XRP to its clients is prompting token holders to conceive of ever-more ingenious means to fight back.
In a tweet published on Aug. 26, Twitter user @CryptoBitlord quipped to his 102,000 followers about his latest scheme for a community effort, writing:
“I’m thinking about forking $XRP so we don’t have to deal with the founders dumping. — This will be a community effort. Retweet if you’re in.”
Crypto Bitlord’s anger has spilled over beyond witticisms; 3 weeks ago, he started a change.org petition entitled “Stop Ripple dumping,” which has secured almost 2,500 signatures by press time.
“We will stage a community takeover”
Earlier today, Crypto Bitlord tweeted to Ripple’s CEO and CTO:
“Brad Garlinghouse, Joel Katz, you now have 60 days to stop dumping XRP or we will stage a community takeover. If it’s a decentralized network like you say, we have the power to do it.”
As previously reported, Ripple’s quarterly reports have consistently revealed the high number of XRP tokens the company is selling to fund its investments in different firms that have the potential to grow the XRP ecosystem and to fund its operations.
The most recent, published late July, revealed a quarter-to-quarter increase of XRP sales of around 48%. Ripple, however, noted at the time that it had decided to temporarily pause programmatic sales and put limits on institutional sales. It also pledged to decrease future token sales substantially.
As XRP’s value continues to sink, this has done little to calm investors.
Garlinghouse was today prompted to respond to what he characterized as the FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) surrounding the project, attributing it to questionable sources. He added:
“XRP sales are about helping expand XRP’s utility — building RippleNet & supporting other biz building w/XRP ie Dharma & Forte. Reality is we DECREASED our sales by volume Q/Q and since then the inflation rate of XRP circulating supply has been lower than that of BTC and ETH.”
The security classification hangover
In addition to responding to allegations of purported dumping, Garlinghouse also alluded — but refrained to comment in detail on — recent amendments to an ongoing class action suit against Ripple, in which an investor has alleged that the firm sold XRP as an unregistered security in violation of federal law.
The new filing notably cited guidance issued by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to corroborate its claim that XRP counts as a security.
Garlinghouse briefly responded, stating that “SEC guidance isn’t issued by the Commission and isn’t law, rule or regulation,” and noting that the United Kingdom and others have come out clearly against a securities classification for the token.
