LBRY files notice of appeal against court July decision that buckled the project

The appeal is a change of pace for embattled developers, who had previously signaled an intent to wind down operations in July

by Sebastian Sinclair /

September 8, 2023 08:46 am

Maurice Norbert/Shutterstock, modified by Blockworks

Blockchain-based content-sharing platform LBRY has filed a notice of appeal against a July court decision that sided with the SEC over alleged securities violations.

The appeal, filed Thursday, seeks to challenge a ruling by the First Circuit Court’s final judgment, which imposed a fine on the company and restricted it from participating in future offerings.

It’s a change of pace for the embattled company, which had previously signaled an intent to wind down operations immediately following the court’s decision two months ago.

Initially, the SEC sought a penalty of $22 million against the company, alleging that its LBRY Credit tokens (LBC) were unregistered securities back in March 2021.

The commission, however, scaled back its demands to just over $111,000 in May of this year, citing the company’s “near-defunct” status and lack of funds, Blockworks previously reported.

A request for disgorgement, commonly used to reclaim ill-gotten gains, was withdrawn by the SEC.

Even though LBRY didn’t undertake a traditional initial coin offering, it still acted like a security by keeping tokens it created early on and then selling them later, the regulator argued at the time.

The court’s decision came as a blow to LBRY and its CEO Jeremy Kauffman, who have repeatedly argued that the classification of LBC as a security could endanger the broader US crypto market by establishing precedent.

LBRY’s own decision to appeal Thursday comes amid a series of victories for crypto industry firms including Ripple and Grayscale, who have also battled against federal regulatory judgments.

Last month, Grayscale was granted a small victory in the DC Circuit Court of Appeals when a three-judge panel mandated the SEC review the digital asset management firm’s application to convert its flagship trust into a spot bitcoin ETF.

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