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On July 23, the New York State Department of Financial Services (the “DFS”) issued a press release announcing the establishment of a new Research and Innovation Division (the “Division”) within the DFS.

The Division will take on the responsibility of licensing and supervising entities engaged in “virtual currency business activity”

Blockstack

On July 10, the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) qualified Blockstack PBC’s (“Blockstack’s”) offering circular, enabling Blockstack to commence sales and distribution of up to $40 million worth of its Stacks Tokens (“Stacks”) under Regulation A. This marks the first time in history that the SEC has

On June 4, 2019, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) filed a complaint in the Southern District of New York against Kik Interactive Inc. (“Kik”) alleging violations of Section 5 of the Securities Act of 1933 (the “Securities Act”).

The complaint arises from Kik’s offer and sale of

On April 11, Blockstack Token LLC (“Blockstack”) filed a preliminary offering circular with the SEC for a $50 million token offering under Regulation A of the Securities Act. The offering circular is now under review with the SEC and must be qualified (i.e., cleared) by the SEC before sales of Blockstack’s tokens (“Stacks Tokens”) can be effectuated under the program.

Blockstack’s offering circular is notable because it treats the Stacks Tokens as securities today but discloses that the issuer expects the Stacks Tokens will, at some point in the future, no longer be required to be treated as securities under the federal securities laws. This approach is consistent with recent SEC staff guidance, which stated that the analysis of whether a digital asset represents an investment contract (and thus, a security) may change over time, depending on how the asset is used, offered and sold. Blockstack states that it will refer to the Framework for “Investment Contract” Analysis of Digital Assets, recently published by the SEC’s Strategic Hub for Innovation and Financial Technology, for regulatory guidance in connection with making this determination.

If the SEC qualifies Blockstack’s offering under Regulation A, it will be the first time the SEC has done so for the offer and sale of a blockchain-native digital asset.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) recently issued highly anticipated guidance to assist market participants in determining whether a digital asset is offered and sold as a security.

On April 3, 2019, the SEC’s Strategic Hub for Innovation and Financial Technology published an analytical framework for evaluating whether the offer

On October 18, the SEC announced the launch of a new Strategic Hub for Innovation and Financial Technology (the “FinHub”). The FinHub provides an online portal for market participants to engage with the SEC on a range of FinTech-related issues, including distributed ledger technology and digital assets.

The FinHub contains

At last week’s Yahoo! All Markets Summit in Palo Alto, SEC Division of Corporation Finance Director William Hinman delivered a speech sure to send shockwaves through the crypto world. Applying the Howey test (which sets forth the elements necessary for determining whether a transaction involves the offer or sale of

On May 29, the SEC announced that it had secured injunctive relief halting an allegedly “ongoing fraud” involving an unregistered, non-exempt ICO that raised as much as $21 million in cryptoassets.

The SEC’s complaint charges Titanium Blockchain Infrastructure Services, Inc., EHI Internetwork and Systems Management, Inc. and Michael Stollery, (collectively, the “Titanium defendants”) with fraud in connection with the purchase, offer or sale of securities under Sections 10 and 17 of the Securities Exchange Act and the unregistered offer and sale of securities under Section 5 of the Securities Act.