Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse has introduced that the company will no longer release its quarterly XRP markets reports. This decision marks a significant shift in Ripple’s transparency practices, as the company will now update the public on its XRP holdings through more informal channels like social media and blog posts, rather than bundled quarterly reports. This change comes after the company faced legal challenges, particularly from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and is seen as a way to reduce the legal risks associated with such detailed public disclosures.

Ripple’s quarterly reports, which began in 2017, were originally introduced to provide transparency regarding the company’s holdings and sales of XRP. The reports included detailed information about Ripple’s XRP holdings, as well as data on the amount of XRP sold in the market. These reports were aimed at increasing trust and openness in the cryptocurrency market. However, Garlinghouse explained that while the intention behind the reports was to offer transparency, they were eventually used against Ripple in the ongoing legal dispute with the SEC. The SEC has argued that XRP is a security, and it used some of Ripple’s public disclosures to bolster this claim.

The SEC filed its lawsuit against Ripple in December 2020, accusing the company of selling XRP as an unregistered security. As part of the legal proceedings, the SEC referenced Ripple’s quarterly reports to argue that the company had too much control over XRP and that the cryptocurrency was not sufficiently decentralized. Garlinghouse and other Ripple executives have consistently argued that XRP is a decentralized asset and should not be classified as a security. However, the SEC’s use of the quarterly reports in its case led Ripple to reconsider the value of continuing with such disclosures.

In response to these legal challenges, Ripple has made the decision to move away from the quarterly format. Going forward, the company will still publish information about its XRP holdings on its official website, but it will do so through a more flexible and informal approach. Garlinghouse stated that the decision to stop publishing detailed quarterly reports is part of Ripple’s efforts to continue being transparent while also minimizing the legal risks associated with over-disclosure.

Despite the shift in reporting strategy, Ripple remains committed to maintaining transparency. The company will still share updates about XRP and its holdings, but these updates will now be communicated via a series of blog posts and social media updates. This move is expected to reduce the legal weight of the disclosures, making it less likely for them to be used in the ongoing SEC case.

The decision comes at a time when Ripple holds a significant portion of the total XRP supply. In the last report released in the traditional format, Ripple revealed that it controlled nearly 45.86 billion XRP tokens, which included both its holdings and tokens locked in escrow. At the current price of XRP, these holdings are worth around $99 billion, highlighting Ripple’s major influence on the cryptocurrency market.

While this shift in reporting format is seen as a strategic move to protect Ripple from further regulatory scrutiny, it also underscores the challenges that crypto companies face as they navigate an increasingly complex legal landscape. As the SEC continues to challenge Ripple’s status as a cryptocurrency, the decision to alter its reporting strategy may be part of a broader effort to de-escalate the regulatory tensions that have surrounded the company for the past several years.

In the end, Ripple’s move to end its quarterly XRP reports reflects the evolving relationship between cryptocurrency companies and regulators, as well as the growing need for companies to adapt their strategies to minimize legal risks while maintaining transparency with their communities.