Brian Armstrong said July also brought major product launches, while the settlement surfaced FDIC letters to roughly 20 banks in 2022 and came alongside a separate court loss for much of a customer securities suit.
Coinbase settled its Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in late July 2026, with the agency agreeing to pay $150,000 and change how it keeps records. CEO Brian Armstrong highlighted the result in an August 3 post on X, casting it as part of a broader July that also included many product launches and a legal win he tied to a secret government crackdown on crypto. Coinbase said the case forced disclosure around how the SEC concluded that securities law applied to crypto assets, the legal theory behind more than five years of enforcement actions under former chair Gary Gensler. The litigation also surfaced Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation letters sent to roughly 20 banks in 2022 telling them to pause or hold off on crypto-related activity, which critics have described as "Operation Choke Point 2.0." The legal development came alongside another July result for Coinbase. U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer in Manhattan dismissed much of a separate customer lawsuit accusing the exchange of selling unregistered securities, including claims tied to "matched" transactions estimated at 99.97% of Coinbase's volume and worth hundreds of billions of dollars.