In somewhat of a surprising turn of events, on February 19, 2025, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed voluntary motions to dismiss its appeals of parallel decisions handed down by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor. These decisions had vacated the SEC’s February 2024 “Dealer Rule” that sought to broaden the definition of “dealer” to include proprietary trading firms, certain hedge funds, and crypto firms. This move by the SEC is another indication in…
We have already written about steps taken by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission during the early days of the Trump administration to distinguish itself from the SEC under former chair Gary Gensler. See here. This post examines further evidence of that change. Under Chairman Gensler’s leadership, the SEC took an assertive stance on cryptocurrency regulation. Gensler, who served as SEC Chair from 2021 to January 20, 2025, said that he was prioritizing investor protection…
One of the persistent complaints over the way the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has operated in the digital asset space is its failure to issue clear guidelines. Within days of the inauguration of President Trump, and consistent with SEC acting Chairman Mark Uyeda’s commitment to shifting the regulator toward setting clear guidelines for digital assets, on January 23, 2025, the SEC issued Staff Accounting Bulletin (SAB) No. 122, effectively rescinding the controversial SAB No.…
When President Trump nominated Caroline Crenshaw as a Commissioner of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in 2020, she was confirmed unanimously by the Senate. President Biden renominated Commissioner Crenshaw earlier this year but the Senate did not vote on the confirmation prior to the November 5 election. A vote by the Senate Banking Committee was supposed to take place during a meeting this past Wednesday, December 11, 2024, but the meeting was postponed at…
There have been numerous lawsuits brought against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) alleging that it has acted improperly and outside the law in regulating the crypto industry through enforcement actions and threats – rather than through regulation. See here (Consensys lawsuit) and here (Crypto.com lawsuit). On November 14, 2024, Attorneys General from 18 states brought their own lawsuit, naming as defendants the SEC, Chairman Gary Gensler, and each of the Commissioners (in their…
On January 10, 2024, after 10 years of saying “no,” the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved the application for eleven spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Within four months, Bitcoin hit record highs and more than $30 billion was invested in the Bitcoin ETFs. Then, on May 23, 2024, the SEC surprised the crypto community when it effectively approved the sale of spot Ether ETFs (see here). Those ETFs started trading in late July…
We previously reported on the pre-emptive lawsuit that Consensys Software Inc., a software developer whose business centers on the Ethereum blockchain network, brought against the United States Securities and Exchange Commission in April 2024 in federal court in Texas. The Complaint may be found here. Three of the four counts in the Complaint relate to Consensys’s ETH transactions (ETH is the native token for the Ethereum blockchain). The fourth count relates to Consensys’s two MetaMask software products:…
We recently reported about the pre-emptive lawsuit that Consensys Software Inc., brought against the United States Securities and Exchange Commission over the regulation of Ethereum. We also previously reported on the SEC’s first NFT enforcement action, against Impact Theory, LLC, a media and entertainment company. The SEC’s second NFT enforcement action, against Stoner Cats, was brought a few weeks later, in September 2023. These two actions by the SEC were a big part of the impetus behind…
In a post two months ago, we discussed how the United States Securities and Exchange Commission surprised the crypto community on May 23, 2024 when it effectively set the stage for the sale of spot Ethereum Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) to begin in the not-too-distant future. That day has now arrived. On May 23, 2024, the SEC approved the 19b-4 form for a number of ETH ETF applications (form 19b-4 is a form that is used to inform…
We previously reported about action by the U.S. House of Representatives concerning U.S. Security and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 121 (“SAB 121”), which was issued on March 31, 2022. It requires reporting entities which perform custodial duties in relation to crypto assets to hold those assets on their balance sheet. Doing so means these entities would also be required to take on significant capital, liquidity, and other costs under the existing prudential regulatory…