Ask HN: Legal implications of ICO?

#1

Post by licensekey » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 10:48 PM UTC

Hello, can someone point to resource which would describe the legality of ICOs?

A lot of coverage mentions "scam" and almost all ICOs say "can't be bought by US and EU citizens"

Is there a blog post / paper on that?

Re: Ask HN: Legal implications of ICO?

#2

Post by discombobulate » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 10:51 PM UTC

There's various advice on this page:

https://ico.org.uk/for-the-public/

Re: Ask HN: Legal implications of ICO?

#3

Post by licensekey » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 11:04 PM UTC

discombobulate wrote: post #2

There's various advice on this page: https://ico.org.uk/for-the-public/

I meant Initial Coin Offering

Re: Ask HN: Legal implications of ICO?

#4

Post by cjbprime » Sat, Jul 08, 2017, 11:24 PM UTC

It's somewhat uncharted territory, and I am not a lawyer.

But the non-lawyer consensus seems to be that if you're seeking or accepting investment through your ICO, rather than selling something that is useful to your customers and already exists, you are in effect selling an unlicensed security to unaccredited investors, and in the US this is extremely illegal and regulated by the SEC.

You could Google [ICO unlicensed security] to read more about this take.

Re: Ask HN: Legal implications of ICO?

#5

Post by licensekey » Sun, Jul 09, 2017, 2:58 AM UTC

cjbprime wrote: post #4

It's somewhat uncharted territory, and I am not a lawyer. But the non-lawyer consensus seems to be that if you're seeking or accepting investment through your ICO, rather than selling something that is useful to your customers and already exists, you are in effect selling an unlicensed security to unaccredited investors, and in the US this is extremely illegal and regulated by the SEC. You could Google [ICO unlicense…

thank you, just did Google.

Are there any examples of ICO companies getting in trouble because of SEC?