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US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

reuters.com

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Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#81
post #3
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.

Isn’t it true that the SEC wouldn’t let Coinbase register since they said Bitcoin _isn’t_ a security? It’s my understanding that Coinbase tried.

Bitcoin itself might not be. Even many other currencies might not. But what other "products" they are running? Those could and probably would fall under various classifications.

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#82
post #23

There is a well-documented public history of Coinbase taunting the SEC - they had it coming. - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/the-sec-has-told-us-it-wants-t... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbase-does-not-list-securit... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbases-staking-services-are... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/we-asked-the-sec-for-reasonabl... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbase-takes-another-formal-.…

If criticizing a regulatory body causes them to go after you, then that regulatory body is corrupt and should be dismantled and replaced with something else.

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#84
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That many Americans lost money over. This requires a citation with data points, eg how many Americans lost money, how much money did they lose, etc. Because, what if there are more Americans who've made money than those who have lost? > SEC said Coinbase has since at least 2019 made billions of dollars by handling cryptocurrency transactions, while evading the disclosure requirements meant to protect investors This…

> Because, what if there are more Americans who've made money than those who have lost? Why does this matter? Even if Americans are scamming foreigners (0 Americans losing money), that doesn’t make this legal. The difference between aapl and coinbase is there is regulatory audits of the books and required publications about the health of the security. There are rules about insider trading and insurance protections if…

> Why does this matter?

Because the parent said "that many Americans lost money over". Plus the SEC is "protecting investors". So I'm asking, what if there are more people who've made money over those who lost? Does that mean life's good? Coinbase has been pretty transparent about their operations. Not only transparent, they've publicly mentioned several times how frustrated they are dealing with SEC, the organization that is slow to come up with various legal requirements for the cryptocurrency industry. In a way, Coinbase helps the SEC to raise their own bar.

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#85
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Crypto is for coordinating group behavior in the presence of powerful adversaries (e.g. governments), always has been.

Umm, OK. Funny that's not how it's been marketed. But I'm baffled as to how cryptocurrency is better for doing that than all of the other ways of doing that.

The drugs I've bought with cryptocurrency have been cheaper and of better quality than the drugs I've bought with dollars, by a wide margin. So there's that.

The marketing you're talking about is for the investors. By the nature of the product, the users have powerful adversaries and are probably operating in secret. You can't expect their use cases to show up in the marketing, that would defeat the purpose.

Sure, you get the bad with the good. There are definitely unsavory things going on under the covers. But you have to weigh that against the misbehavior of the powerful in a world where they're more difficult to coordinate against due to a underdeveloped crypto.

It's a trade off, but I think it's a worthwhile one.

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#86
post #15
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.

What's the use of crypto again? Because I think it's kinda useless. Just like NFT's

Destroying our planet even faster by tons and tons of Asics garbage and CO2 production

Lucky enough VC is now going to ml

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This requires a citation with data points, eg how many Americans lost money, how much money did they lose, etc. My coworker lost $X0,000 over Celsius. So yes, maybe this is a personal bias. But its based in reality. His entire account at Celsius is written off. He managed to save his money from Voyager. I got cousins who lost money in FTX. Different people, but same overall problem. If my personal social circle is…

> If my personal social circle is showing huge losses in these companies, I have to imagine that other people out there have similar experiences. This is a personal bias. I've made $86,000 trading Ethereum. My brother-in-law made $24,000 trading Bitcoin. My reality is different from your reality ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I can't speak for Celsius, Voyager, and FTX. If there was a scam, it has to be punished. No questions asked. But…

That's irrelevant.

By definition, Ponzi schemes involve some investors making a lot of money and others losing. That doesn't make them any less illegal.

If some people are harmed by unlawful behavior, that is a reason to prosecute, just the same as if you mugged Alice and bought Bob an icecream with the proceeds.

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#88
post #82
post #23

There is a well-documented public history of Coinbase taunting the SEC - they had it coming. - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/the-sec-has-told-us-it-wants-t... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbase-does-not-list-securit... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbases-staking-services-are... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/we-asked-the-sec-for-reasonabl... - https://www.coinbase.com/blog/coinbase-takes-another-formal-.…

If criticizing a regulatory body causes them to go after you, then that regulatory body is corrupt and should be dismantled and replaced with something else.

Taunt and criticize are two different verbs

Re: US SEC sues Coinbase, one day after suing Binance

#90
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that I agree with the own planet thing; but yes -- it's odd. All of this was 100% predictable and should have been expected by everyone. The stated purpose of crypto was to get around this; its weird to see crypto fans "get mad" at e.g. the SEC. It's like getting mad at a shark for going after bleeding prey; it's just what was always going to happen.

Mad because some entrepreneurs makes the effort to build legitimate business entities, and what certain governments find to do is any scheme to keep them out of legitimity. Not that crypto fans would care all that much about these businesses, but there is a need to onramp and offramp given transactions are made in their vast majority in fiat. An exchange run as a business having at least a lot at stake in ensuring co…

> Mad because some entrepreneurs makes the effort to build legitimate business entities, and what certain governments find to do is any scheme to keep them out of legitimity.

This isn't what it looks like to me. It looks to me like the entire point of cyptocurrency was to complete route around regulations that these people thought were too onerous. That's not building a "legitimate" business, that's taking a risk and building a business in the hopes that it will end up being legitimized.

I think that if you're taking a big risk and lose, it's unseemly to be mad at anyone except yourself.

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