Forbes Takes Down Article Titled “Why SEC Treats Ripple and Ethereum Differently”

Is Forbes willingly attempting to hide the actuality of the ongoing Ripple-SEC lawsuit? Or is the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) compelling Forbes to conceal critical facts that reveal its detected regulatory foul plays and impartialities? 

Forbes, a global media company, focusing on business, investing, technology, entrepreneurship, leadership, and lifestyle took down a publication that condemned the SEC’s actions against Ripple Labs Inc. and XRP a couple of hours ago. 

Following this controversial development, many concerns have been raised by Ripple/ XRP proponents alongside the broader cryptocurrency community. Likewise, many crypto proponents have slammed Forbes, indirectly labeling the top media company an accessory of the U.S. SEC and a supporter of the agency’s undue clampdowns on several crypto projects including LBRY’s LBC token, Ripple/ XRP, Paxos-issued BUSD, and Kraken’s staking-as-a-service (SaaS) program.

This publication captioned ‘Why SEC Treats Ripple and Ethereum Differently’ was published on the Forbes platform on February 15 and authored by Roslyn Layton, Ph.D., a broadband economist, and International Tech Policy guru. But the article was later concealed about a day after. However, a certain Twitter user, King Blue took a screenshot of the article before it was taken down by Forbes, and shared it today.

Read Also: Ripple to Commit about $1 Million in XRP For Turkey-Syria Earthquake Relief 

Per the screenshots, Dr. Layton noted that the SEC is inconsistent and impartial in its handling of matters in the crypto industry, using XRP and Ether (ETH) as an example.

“Regulators aren’t supposed to choose the market’s winners and losers, yet it’s hard to ignore how securities laws are applied differently to the Ethereum (ETH) Foundation, compared to companies like Ripple,” Layton wrote. 

The securities watchdog has been battling with the San Francisco-based cross-border payment firm, Ripple for over two years, alleging that the XRP Ledger digital token — XRP — which the crypto solutions company sold years ago for over $1.3 billion is an unregistered security. 

But the same agency implied that Ether (ETH), the native token of the largest smart contract platform, Ethereum, is not a security. William Bill Hinman, a former director of finance at the SEC stated this in his 2018 speech documents, which is today highly controversial and critical in the ongoing Ripple-SEC case. 

The SEC employed several tactics to hide the Hinman Speech Documents from the court and Ripple. However, after about 18 months and 6 court orders, the Gary Gensler-led SEC released the controversial Hinman Speech Documents to Ripple, begging that the crypto company keep the information in Hinman’s internal drafts and emails confidential. 

According to Dr. Layton, “the speech seems inscrutable. It declared one crypto asset – Ethereum’s native token ether- as outside the securities laws. Subsequently, the SEC launched the case against a similar project to Ethereum-Ripple-seeking billions in penalties for a virtually identical offering that reasonably appeared to fit Hinman’s criteria for ether.” “As a regulatory scholar, I am concerned about the inconsistency,” she added in the now-hidden article. 

At the time of writing, Forbes is yet to make any statement regarding its action on the Dr. Layton-authored article discussing why SEC chooses to treat Ripple and Ethereum differently.

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