Tag: SEC

SEC approves tokenized securities to trade alongside traditional stocks

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The US Securities and Exchange Commission has approved a Nasdaq rule change that enables the trading of securities in tokenized form, marking a major step in integrating blockchain-based assets into traditional market infrastructure. The approval allows eligible securities, including stocks from the Russell 1000 and ETFs tracking major indices such as the S&P 500, to be represented and traded as tokenized assets on Nasdaq. These tokenized versions will trade on the same order book as traditional shares, with identical execution priority, pricing, and market data treatment. Under the framework, tokenized…

SEC Chair Explains Why NFTs Aren’t Securities

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After the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) outlined four broad categories of digital assets that fall outside securities laws, Chair Paul Atkins offered further clarity on why nonfungible tokens (NFTs) generally do not meet that definition. In a Wednesday interview with CNBC, Atkins reiterated that the agency’s recent interpretive release identified four types of digital assets that are typically not considered securities: digital commodities, digital tools, digital collectibles such as NFTs, and stablecoins. During the interview, host Andrew Ross Sorkin pressed Atkins on digital collectibles, noting they could more…

Coin Center Urges SEC To Prioritize Rulemaking Over No-Action Letters

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Crypto lobby group Coin Center has urged the US Securities and Exchange Commission to stop addressing individual crypto cases reactively and instead start setting clear rules. “Individualized relief can provide short-term clarity, but it risks fragmentation, implicit merit regulation, and uneven treatment across projects,” Coin Center said in a letter to the SEC, urging the regulator to “prioritize rulemaking wherever possible.” “The true value of crypto networks lies in their character as utility-like public goods rather than as services operated by private corporations or associations,” the letter read.  The letter,…

SEC will Consider most Crypto Assets not Securities under Federal Law

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In one of its first actions since signing a memorandum of understanding with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said it would interpret how “non-security crypto assets” fall under federal securities laws. In a Tuesday notice, the SEC said its interpretation of how to address crypto assets would serve as an “important bridge” as lawmakers in the US Congress consider market structure legislation which will codify how financial regulators oversee digital assets.  The commission said the interpretation would provide a “coherent token taxonomy…

SEC says most crypto assets fall outside securities laws, including staking, airdrops, and mining

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SEC Chair Paul Atkins said Tuesday that the agency is implementing a token taxonomy and investment contract interpretation aimed at ending years of uncertainty over when crypto assets fall under federal securities laws. Speaking at the DC Blockchain Summit on March 17, Atkins said the framework would classify digital commodities, digital collectibles, digital tools, and payment stablecoins under the GENIUS Act as categories that are not deemed securities. He said only digital securities, meaning tokenized forms of traditional securities, would remain clearly subject to securities laws under the new interpretation.…

DeFi Education Fund Drops SEC Lawsuit as Crypto Stance Softens

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Texas-based apparel company Beba and crypto lobby group DeFi Education Fund have withdrawn a 2024 lawsuit against the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) over its approach to airdrops, citing a recent shift in the regulator’s approach to crypto. Beba launched a free token airdrop in March 2024 and, together with the DeFi Education Fund, filed a pre-enforcement challenge against the SEC that year. The lawsuit alleged the regulator had adopted its digital asset enforcement policy without a formal notice-and-comment rulemaking process, in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act. The…

SEC considers ending mandatory quarterly earnings reports for US companies: WSJ

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The US Securities and Exchange Commission is preparing a proposal that would allow public companies to report earnings twice a year instead of the long-standing quarterly reporting requirement. According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, the proposal could be released as soon as next month. Before publishing the rule, regulators have been consulting with major stock exchanges about how their listing requirements might need to change if companies are given the option to report results every six months instead of every quarter. If the proposal is formally issued,…

SEC Drops Case Against BitClout Nader Al-Naji

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The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has dropped its two-year-long case against the founder of the blockchain-based social media platform BitClout, Nader Al-Naji.  In the joint dismissal stipulation filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York last Thursday, the SEC cited the crypto task force, which was tasked with developing a regulatory framework for crypto in January 2025, and a “reassessment of the evidentiary record” as the basis for dismissal. However, the regulator cautioned in a statement that this case outcome doesn’t necessarily mean…

SEC drops fraud case against BitClout founder Nader ‘Diamondhands’ Al-Naji

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The US Securities and Exchange Commission has agreed to dismiss its civil fraud lawsuit against Nader Al-Naji, the founder of the BitClout blockchain project, now DeSo, according to a joint stipulation filed this week in the Southern District of New York. The SEC originally filed the lawsuit in July 2024, accusing Al-Naji of conducting an unregistered securities offering through the sale of BTCLT, the native token of BitClout. Al-Naji allegedly marketed BitClout as a decentralized project with no central operator, even launching the platform under the pseudonym “Diamondhands.” The SEC…

SEC, CFTC Handshake on Memo to Regulate Markets in Harmony

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Two of the US’s most influential financial regulators have agreed to better coordinate oversight of the financial markets, seeking to put an end to decades of “regulatory turf wars” between them. According to the memorandum of understanding written on Wednesday, the US Securities and Exchange Commission and US Commodity Futures Trading Commission said it has become a “pivotal time” to regulate in harmony as new technologies, such as crypto, make it more challenging to monitor the markets: “New trading models, digital infrastructure, and onchain, automated systems increasingly blur traditional jurisdictional…