U.S. District Judge Raymond Dearie of the Eastern District of New York has ruled that initial coin offerings (ICOs) may be subject to securities law. The ruling came in the court’s denial of defendant Maksim Zaslavkiy’s motion to dismiss an indictment that alleges that he committed securities fraud for selling tokens that he claimed represented shares in a real estate venture and a separate diamond business. Zaslavskiy’s motion to dismiss argued that the investment schemes and their related ICOs did not involve securities and are beyond the reach of federal securities laws and that the securities laws, specifically the Exchange Act and SEC Rule 10b-5, are unconstitutionally vague as applied to this case.