“Let’s be clear: Ripple is different from my coin,” said Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of distributed ledger startup Ripple, at the CB Insights Future of Fintech conference on Thursday.

Garlinghouse began his speech by dismissing arguments that his coin could be considered a security, given its close association with the San Francisco company. He also spoke about the work done by the company to date in partnership with a number of banks and financial firms. Perhaps his most scathing comments came in response to a question about whether his coin was a security for Ripple, a claim that he and other Ripple employees vehemently denied.

A senior Securities and Exchange Commission official recently stated that other coins are not securities, and the lack of similar comments about his coin has renewed this criticism.

As he explained during the CB Insights event: “My coin is not a security for three reasons: if Ripple closes tomorrow, my coin registry will continue to work; it is an open source decentralized technology… if you buy my coin, [you] are not buying shares in Ripple – buying my coin does not give you ownership of Ripple.”

Garlinghouse also echoed his concerns about bitcoin, saying, “I own… [and] am bullish on bitcoin, but we have to admit… when we talked about something centralized and decentralized, control is a key element.”