Kevin Helms
A student of Austrian economics, Kevin found Bitcoin in 2011 and has been an evangelist ever since. His interests lie in Bitcoin security, open source systems, network effects and the intersection of finance and cryptography.
SEC Chairman Explains Why He Sees All Crypto Tokens Other Than Bitcoin As Securities – Regulation Bitcoin News
Chairman of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Gary Gensler has described why he considers all crypto tokens other than bitcoin to be securities. While he acknowledged that crypto tokens can have different setups, he emphasized that “at their core, these tokens are securities.”
SEC chief believes all crypto tokens other than Bitcoin are securities
US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler explained why he believes all crypto tokens other than bitcoin are securities in an interview published Thursday by New York Magazine’s Intelligencer.
Gensler believes that the securities watchdog has all the legal tools needed to monitor the crypto sector, the publication reported, adding that the SEC chief explained that virtually all kinds of crypto transactions already fall under the SEC’s jurisdiction except spot transactions in bitcoin itself and the actual purchase or sale of goods or services with cryptocurrency.
The SEC chairman was quoted as saying:
Anything but bitcoin… you can find a website, you can find a group of entrepreneurs, they can create their legal entities in an offshore tax haven, they can have a foundation, they can lawyer it to try to arbitrage and do it hard jurisdiction or so on.
“They can first release tokens overseas and claim or pretend it will be six months before they come back to the US,” Gensler continued without naming any cryptocurrencies specifically. He emphasized:
But at their core, these tokens are securities because there is a group in the middle and the public expects profits based on that group.
Following Gensler’s claim that all crypto tokens other than BTC are securities, a number of people took to social media to disagree with the SEC chief. Attorney Jake Chervinsky tweeted:
Chairman Gensler may have prejudged that every digital asset except bitcoin is a security, but his opinion is not the law.
“The SEC lacks the authority to regulate any of them until and unless it proves its case in court,” Chervinsky stressed, adding that this must be done “For each asset, each one, individually, one at a time.” Logan Bolinger, another attorney, similarly said on Twitter: “In this country, judges — not SEC executives — decide what the law means and how it applies. Doesn’t mean his thoughts are irrelevant. They are just not dispositive.”
What do you think about SEC Chairman Gary Gensler considering all crypto tokens other than bitcoin as securities? Let us know in the comments section below.
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