Months before the SEC's lawsuit, Coinbase filed amicus briefs in two crypto-related SEC cases, aiming to aid its own defense, an unusual federal court strategy
Jody Godoy / Reuters :
Context & Ripple Effects
Coinbase has been building a courtroom record for months. In late 2022 it asked to file an amicus brief backing Ripple in the SEC's XRP case, and by May 2023 it was telegraphing a novel defense arguing the regulator shares blame for approving its IPO. The new reporting shows those moves were not isolated gestures but part of a deliberate pre-enforcement strategy: filing briefs in two separate SEC cases before the agency sued Coinbase itself.
First-order effects
- Coinbase gains ammunition for its own dismissal fight — arguments seeded in other SEC crypto cases can now be cited as established positions when it argues its exchange doesn't trade securities.
- The SEC now faces a counterparty that has shaped the legal narrative across multiple cases simultaneously, rather than responding only after being sued.
Second-order effects
- Other crypto defendants under SEC scrutiny have a template to copy — Coinbase's Ripple brief shows even non-sued firms can influence rulings that later anchor their own defenses.
- The SEC's October move citing the Terraform Labs ruling against Coinbase's dismissal request shows the agency fighting back with precedent of its own, turning every related case into shared terrain.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, crypto regulation will be contested through coordinated litigation strategies rather than rulemaking — with exchanges pre-positioning arguments across many cases and regulators leaning on rulings like Terraform Labs to hold the line.
The trend: Crypto companies are shifting from reactive compliance to proactive litigation campaigns, seeding legal arguments across multiple SEC cases before enforcement ever targets them.