Ripple Lawyer Says XRP Already Has Clarity After Senate CLARITY Act Defeat

Ripple’s top lawyer stepped in with a legal reality check hours after the Senate’s CLARITY Act cloture vote collapsed.

Stuart Alderoty, Ripple’s Chief Legal Officer, told markets that XRP legal status did not hinge on the bill in the first place.

He cited the 2023 federal court ruling that cleared XRP in secondary market sales, and the March 2026 joint SEC-CFTC interpretation that formally named XRP a digital commodity.

Two Legal Pillars That the Senate Vote Could Not Touch

Ripple Chief Legal Officer Stuart Alderoty moved quickly to reassure markets after the Senate failed to pass the CLARITY Act in a 49 to 50 cloture vote.

Alderoty posted on X that XRP legal status remains unchanged. He pointed to two pillars. The 2023 federal court ruling that XRP is not a security, and a March 2026 joint interpretation by the SEC and CFTC naming XRP a digital commodity.

Alderoty’s post laid out his argument in structured terms. The first pillar is the 2023 ruling from Judge Analisa Torres.

As CoinGape reported, the 2023 ruling confirmed XRP is not a security on programmatic and secondary-market sales.

The second pillar arrived in March 2026, when the SEC and CFTC jointly named XRP a digital commodity alongside BTC, ETH, SOL, and ADA.

That combination matters for a specific reason. An agency interpretation can be walked back by a future commission.

A federal court judgment cannot be quietly erased. That is precisely why Alderoty led with the court ruling first, then added the regulatory layer on top.

Meanwhile, Ripple CEO blamed Democratic politics for the bill’s collapse and promised a post-mortem on the Senate outcome.

Alderoty’s follow-up sharpened the investor-facing message. His point was not that the industry was fine. It was that XRP’s legal status specifically had not moved.

In August 2025, Ripple and the SEC jointly dismissed the appeals, closing the litigation chapter that began in December 2020.

No active appeal can reopen the Torres doctrine now. The court ground is settled. As Alderoty had earlier argued, Ripple, XRPL, and XRP already fit the CLARITY Act framework by design. That is partly why the bill’s defeat does not rewrite Ripple’s compliance posture.

Rulemaking Is Now the Next Catalyst for XRP

With the statute off the table for now, Alderoty pointed to the agencies. SEC Chair Paul Atkins and CFTC Chair Brian Selig will take the lead on what comes next.

He said both chairs understand these markets and that investors should expect future rulemaking to set clear rules for trading, custody, and digital asset products.

That path is already in motion. The SEC and CFTC are seeking public comment on a harmonized framework for BTC, ETH, and XRP futures.

The investor question shifts from whether Congress will classify XRP to how fast Atkins and Selig produce durable rules.

The stakes are real. U.S. spot XRP ETFs have topped $1.7B in net inflows. Those products rest on the premise that XRP is a non-security, commodity-class asset.

That premise now relies on the Torres ruling and the March 2026 interpretation, not on legislation that never passed.

On the market side, the vote had already been priced in. XRP options volume had exploded 350% ahead of the session, making the positioning crowded.

After the 49-50 result, XRP dropped roughly 7.3%. ETH fell 5.2%, and BTC shed 3.7%, with around $670 million in 24-hour liquidations across the market.

On the commercial side, Ripple’s operations continue separate from the vote. Ripple Treasury is nearing a $13 trillion settlement milestone alongside Swift, JPMorgan, and Goldman Sachs. Alderoty’s signal to allocators was that the legal floor under that stack did not move.

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