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SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

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171–180 of 360 posts

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, this describes tax code and legislation in general. I'm hoping we can get text parsing models to the point that they can be utilized to simplify legal documents or even the entire US Tax Code. Like, Google Translate can translate Chinese to English decently, imagine if one day it could translate Legal Tax Code MumboJumbo to English as well? Or even cooler, if you could plug in your personal details (well, ter…

The funny thing is, the IRS can already do this without any text parsing of legislation for domestic taxes. They have all the data and rule sets to completely automate the filing process. In Australia the government has official tax software. It pulls all your PAYG information and auto-fills most of what you need. In NZ, people don't file taxes at all. They login to the IRD website and their tax data is populated. Yo…

> They have all the data and rule sets to completely automate the filing process.

My partner works in outside sales as an agent for a "Fortune 100" company, and the IRS in no way has all the data to automate any part of her taxes. From the way she's compensated, to the reimbursements, to the legitimate business expeses.. there's no way she'd get a good deal if she let the IRS guess at any of that.

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comments like this are ludicrous. Do you really think the SEC doesn't understand distributed ledgers or ethereum contracts? Second, do you think anyone has technical staff that are capable of writing safe contracts in Solidity (Parity wallet would suggest not...). In short, the idea that people must be incompetent because they're in the government is pretty ludicrous. The SEC is consistently one of the best technical…

Is your hedge fund registered with the SEC? What's the name of it? I've been thinking about crypto hedge funds lately and am genuinely curious.

From HN profile

> General Partner, Crypto Lotus. > Cryptolotus.com

First google result for "crypyolotus sec" is an apparent SEC filing: https://goo.gl/txKA3t

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#173
post #65
post #11

I'm not terribly happy with the decision, though I can't say I'm surprised. I enjoy the drama of the Wild West that is Ethereum and the rest of the cryptocurrency ecosystem. Minimal regulation encourages innovation, while regulated markets can exist for people who want stability and certain guarantees to prevent fraud (or at least make it difficult). I wonder what would happen if financial regulations became more "op…

There is no (useful) innovation in the ICO space. I would even want to argue that is makes a lot of innovation hard or impossible.

What about dominant assurance contracts for funding public goods?

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#174
post #75
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming that would be unwise. In general, US securities laws cover anything that looks or works something like a security. There have been clever attempts to get around this before. They didn't work.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SEC_v._W._J._Howey_Co .

You're right, but in the case of things like Storj and Sia, for instance, the ICO token is used to pay for the services offered by the network. What it really is, is a tradable pre-sale. It's as if you could trade the perks offered by a Kickstarter. I'm not sure if that would make it exempt or not, but it is an interesting legal question.

the ICO token is used to pay for the services offered by the network.

And the ICO token is also used (and sometimes explicitly advertised) for investment as well. Uh oh.

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The funny thing is, the IRS can already do this without any text parsing of legislation for domestic taxes. They have all the data and rule sets to completely automate the filing process. In Australia the government has official tax software. It pulls all your PAYG information and auto-fills most of what you need. In NZ, people don't file taxes at all. They login to the IRD website and their tax data is populated. Yo…

> They have all the data and rule sets to completely automate the filing process. My partner works in outside sales as an agent for a "Fortune 100" company, and the IRS in no way has all the data to automate any part of her taxes. From the way she's compensated, to the reimbursements, to the legitimate business expeses.. there's no way she'd get a good deal if she let the IRS guess at any of that.

Okay, but then there's the other XX% of Americans who only have W-2 income.

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#176
post #11

I'm not terribly happy with the decision, though I can't say I'm surprised. I enjoy the drama of the Wild West that is Ethereum and the rest of the cryptocurrency ecosystem. Minimal regulation encourages innovation, while regulated markets can exist for people who want stability and certain guarantees to prevent fraud (or at least make it difficult). I wonder what would happen if financial regulations became more "op…

It also encourages scams, and based on the ethereum world there's more scams than innovation

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is simply a massive difference between the theory of democracy and its actual implementation. Your personal autonomy is restricted by the government, massively, period, generally for everyone's own good. They decide what and how much medicine you can put in your body. Whether you can gamble, and where, and on what, and how much. What drugs you can take. What speed you can drive. Whether you must go to school or…

>Your personal autonomy is restricted by the government, massively, period, generally for everyone's own good. They decide what and how much medicine you can put in your body. Whether you can gamble, and where, and on what, and how much. What drugs you can take. What speed you can drive. Whether you must go to school or not based on your age. Which food you can buy at the supermarket. These restrictions violate peopl…

I second "It's just the way things are".

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the SEC should show that it protects everyone's rights One sure-fire way to get the SEC to go absolutely ballistic is to hurt mom-and-pop investors. This is why the commission was founded [1] and why securities law maintains "accredited investor" thresholds, controversial as they are. > Is there a straightforward way to do an Edgar filing that doesn't require a bunch of training? Securities lawyers are a few thousa…

Why shouldn't mom-and-pop get the choice to invest in SEC regulated companies? If you like what the SEC has to offer, you can keep it. Taking away that choice seems paternalistic at best, corrupt at worst.

So this is kind of an oddly phrased question. It's probably better to think of things in terms of offerings instead of companies. One company might have different offerings using different mechanisms to raise money. And different people can participate in different offerings. Pretty much anybody can participate in a registered offering or a Reg A offering, often called a mini-registration.

A Reg D offering is however limited to accredited investors. With Reg D the SEC is basically saying "We won't require as much disclosure from you, but you'll have to raise money from a more sophisticated investor, ostensibly."

Edit: spelling

Re: SEC Issues Report Concluding DAO Tokens, a Digital Asset, Were Securities

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the SEC should show that it protects everyone's rights One sure-fire way to get the SEC to go absolutely ballistic is to hurt mom-and-pop investors. This is why the commission was founded [1] and why securities law maintains "accredited investor" thresholds, controversial as they are. > Is there a straightforward way to do an Edgar filing that doesn't require a bunch of training? Securities lawyers are a few thousa…

Why shouldn't mom-and-pop get the choice to invest in SEC regulated companies? If you like what the SEC has to offer, you can keep it. Taking away that choice seems paternalistic at best, corrupt at worst.

Should they also have the choice to take non-FDA approved drugs?
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