US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

Post by ohgodplsno » Tue, Jun 06, 2023, 4:47 PM UTC

whimsicalism wrote: post #162

this_user wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's more a case that anyone who was involved in crypto early, and who has actually taken the time to understand the technology, has realised about a decade ago that crypto currencies are mostly useless. But then people had they idea that they could still make money from it by grifting people if they just added layer upon layer of complexity in order to disguise the ultimate uselessness of the underlying tech…

> I think it's more a case that anyone who was involved in crypto early, and who has actually taken the time to understand the technology, has realised about a decade ago that crypto currencies are mostly useless. I don't know what it is about crypto that makes HN commentators want to make the most ridiculous, put-downy statements without evidence to back it up. Crypto is not mostly useless, it is just that people do…

Post by arctek » Tue, Jun 06, 2023, 4:52 PM UTC

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #150

johndhi wrote: post #124

Question: is it even possible to register as a security? If you do, what follows? So if SOL for example were to register somewhere, what would they need to do, and what would I need to do to buy it?

There’s no fundamental reason it would be impossible. Solana Labs would need to file a registration statement with the SEC ( https://www.sec.gov/education/smallbusiness/goingpublic/regi... ) including among other things a description of its business practices and audited financial statements. Once they did that, you would be able to buy and sell it at any registered exchange who’s willing to list it. Coinbase, maybe,…

Post by nradov » Tue, Jun 06, 2023, 4:54 PM UTC

whimsicalism wrote: post #158

mrcode007 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very good points. People often go a long way to argue against the Howey test. The best example is Howey Co case. If someone is a lawyer dealing in securities and acting as an advisor I would have expected them to be familiar with the law. Coinbase issuing public statements to SEC “tell us what is a security” were basically a ploy or the lawyers involved were extremely inexperienced. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SE…

It is not obvious a priori how regulators will treat tokens or which ones will be permissible.

Post by 0xbadcafebee » Tue, Jun 06, 2023, 4:56 PM UTC

butlerm wrote: post #48

If you look up the definitions of "security", "financial instrument", "commodity", and "currency", it is pretty clear that a plain vanilla crypto-currency like Bitcoin is no ordinary security nor a financial instrument. It is not a claim on something else, even less so than a traditional bank note. It is more like a commodity. Since when is "aluminum" a security? A crypto currency business however may be engaged in t…

Post by stonogo » Tue, Jun 06, 2023, 4:57 PM UTC

dcow wrote: post #105

TimPC wrote: post #2

Crypto companies think they don't trade securities which is clearly wrong and contradicted by their own advertising. People buy crypto without a real use for crypto because they think they can sell it for more later. Everyone under the sun knows this. It's obviously a security and failing to register should be met by SEC cases like this one.

There are two modalities to crypto and the law needs to treat them differently. Running a node on a crypto currency network does not generate securities. It generates commodities. We don't tax people on the FMV of gold when they dig it out of the ground. But, speculating on the price of gold by creating a virtual token/contract/etc. and selling that, well that’s obviously a security. Just because people buy gold spec…