In remarks made at the Yahoo! All Markets Summit in New York, Heath Tarbert, Chairman of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), said that he believed the Ether cryptocurrency was a “commodity” and should be regulated under the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA). This statement follows the agency’s December 2018
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SEC Qualifies Blockstack and YouNow Regulation A Offerings
By Trevor Dodge & Allen S. Li on
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…
Gladius Escapes Fines for Unregistered ICO after Self-Reporting to the SEC
By Corey I. Rogoff on
On February 20, 2019, the SEC announced that it settled charges against Gladius Network LLC (“Gladius”) for failing to register non-exempt offers and sales of securities in violation of Sections 5(a) and 5(c) of the Securities Act. While the SEC has previously settled charges relating to unregistered ICOs, this is one of few occasions since its 2017 DAO Report that the SEC refrained from imposing civil monetary penalties for an ICO that it determined violated the registration requirements of the federal securities laws.
Lawsuit Alleging that LATX Tokens are Securities Survives Motion to Dismiss
By Divya Taneja on
On December 10th, 2018, a U.S. District Judge for the District of New Jersey denied Latium Network, Inc. (“Latium”) and its co-founders’ motion to dismiss a class action alleging violations of Section 5 of the Securities Act of 1933 (the “Act”) for offering and selling unregistered securities in the form of Latium X (“LATX”) tokens.
Federal Judge Rules Securities Laws May Cover ICOs
By Divya Taneja on
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.
SEC Director William Hinman: “Current offers and sales of Ether are not securities transactions”
By Trevor Dodge on
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…