Coinbase reaches a settlement with the U.S. SEC over the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit and promotes reforms in record-keeping policies

According to The Wall Street Journal, Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal stated that Coinbase has reached a settlement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission regarding a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, with the SEC agreeing to pay $150,000 and amend its record-keeping policies. The lawsuit revealed that the SEC lost nearly a year’s worth of communications from former Chairman Gary Gensler and other senior officials during the peak enforcement period in the cryptocurrency industry.

Coinbase had previously requested documents from the SEC regarding how it applies securities laws to digital assets, but the request was denied, leading to a lawsuit that received court support. The SEC claimed that some text messages were lost due to an automatic data deletion process. Grewal pointed out that the SEC has imposed billions of dollars in fines on financial institutions for similar record-keeping issues.

In February of this year, Coinbase also reached a settlement with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation regarding another Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Coinbase stated that this lawsuit revealed that the FDIC had instructed nearly twenty banks to suspend cryptocurrency-related activities since 2022, which subsequently led to congressional hearings and resulted in a court ruling that the FDIC violated federal law.

Grewal stated that both lawsuits revolve around government transparency and due process, emphasizing that the American public has the right to know whether regulatory agencies are restricting legitimate cryptocurrency businesses from accessing banking services through non-public means.