Ripple Fires Back at SEC's Unreasonable Demands, DOGE up as Elon Musk's Xpayments Nears Launch, Max Keiser Expects XRP to Crash to $0.01: Crypto News Digest by U.Today

This weekend was quite eventful for the crypto industry, so check out the top three news stories by U.Today to stay updated.

Ripple fires back at SEC's unreasonable demands in big new filing

According to the latest X post by James K. Filan, defense lawyer who is closely following the Ripple-SEC case, the fintech company has objected to the regulatory agency's request for post-complaint discovery. As stated in the filing, the SEC is to compel Ripple to produce audited financial statements for the years 2022 and 2023, produce all post-complaint contracts for the sale or transfer of XRP to "non-employee counterparties" and answer a question about the amount of "XRP institutional sales proceeds" received after the filing of the complaint for certain contracts. Ripple opposes these requests for two reasons: first, they are untimely. Ripple states that the SEC had ample opportunity to seek much of the requested discovery while fact discovery was open, but it decided not to and it now lacks valid reason for doing so. Second, the SEC’s discovery requests seek information that is irrelevant to remedies.

Dogecoin (DOGE) price goes green as Elon Musk's Xpayments nears launch

On Sunday, Jan. 21, Dogecoin saw its price spiking by more than 14%, from $0.079 to $0.091. The trigger for this impressive price increase was Elon Musk and his ambitious project, Xpayments. The world-famous centibillionaire has been creating a lot of buzz with his plans to turn X into a super application that offers a wide range of services, including financial ones. Notably, the X platform has officially launched its Xpayments account, which indicates a significant step into the financial sector. Further evidence of Musk's dedication to this venture is obtaining licenses for money operations in multiple U.S. states. According to reports, X is preparing to launch peer-to-peer payments, and Musk has hinted that they would become accessible to the general public by mid-2024. The growth of the DOGE price coincides with the unveiling of updates to Xpayments' social media page, which caused a wave of speculation about a potential integration or collaboration between Dogecoin and X. However, neither Dogecoin reps nor ELon Musk himself gave no comments in this regard yet.

Max Keiser expects XRP to crash to $0.01

In a recent X post, Max Keiser, prominent Bitcoin supporter, took a jab at XRP, the fifth largest crypto by market cap, predicting that the asset will soon see a massive price drop. Keiser called XRP “centralized garbage” and stated that it is “going to $0.01.” This is not the first attack on the Ripple-affiliated token made by Keiser. In summer 2023, Keiser commented on an X post by John Deaton devoted to Bitcoin maximalists, and the SEC and claimed that XRP is too centralized, and the SEC's lawsuit against Ripple was a proof of that. Bitcoin, on the contrary, per Keiser, was completely and “uniquely” out of regulators’ reach. Other cryptocurrencies, such as ADA and SOL, could not escape Keiser's criticism either; the Bitcoin evangelist often slams these assets in his X posts, calling them securities and founders of Cardano and Solana - scammers. As for XRP, it is currently changing hands at $0.5255, down by almost 5% over the past 24 hours, per CoinMarketCap.