News & Analysis as of

Cryptocurrency Enforcement Actions Investment Contract

Fenwick & West LLP

Crypto Litigation and Enforcement: Q3 2024 - Key Takeaways and Updates

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Civil and criminal litigation heated up this summer in high-profile crypto matters that will affect crypto projects moving forward. For their quarterly crypto lit update, partner David Feder and associates Rebecca...more

Fenwick & West LLP

Crypto Litigation & Enforcement: H1 2024  - Key Takeaways and Updates

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The beginning of this year brought several legal milestones in the world of crypto litigation and enforcement. In the first live installment of our quarterly update webinar, we discussed how...more

Latham & Watkins LLP

Ruling for SEC Clears Path for Continued Litigation in SEC v. Coinbase

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The decision, which addresses a broad range of market activity by Coinbase relating to 13 third-party tokens, could have significant implications for market participants. On March 27, 2024, Judge Katherine Failla of the US...more

The Volkov Law Group

TradeStation Settles Securities Violations Stemming From its Crypto Yield Product

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On February 7, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) announced charges and a related cease-and-desist order (the “Order”) against TradeStation Crypto, Inc. (“TradeStation”) for failing to register the...more

Troutman Pepper

Inside Look: The SEC’s Enforcement Action Against Cryptocurrency Exchange Kraken

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On November 20, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) instituted a civil enforcement action against Kraken, a major U.S. cryptocurrency exchange. The SEC alleged Kraken operated as an unregistered broker, dealer,...more

A&O Shearman

SEC charges Impact Theory for unregistered offering of NFTs

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On August 28, 2023, the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) charged Impact Theory, LLC (“Impact Theory”), a media and entertainment company headquartered in Los Angeles, with conducting an unregistered securities...more

Jones Day

SEC Brings Its First Enforcement Action Against Non-Fungible Token Sellers

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Two SEC commissioners dissented and urged the Commission to provide further guidance on non-fungible tokens ("NFTs")....more

Mayer Brown Free Writings + Perspectives

For the First Time, the US SEC Sanctions an NFT Issuer for Selling Unregistered Securities in SEC v. Impact Theory

In a published settlement of the charges on August 28, 2023, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) stated that non-fungible tokens (“NFTs”) issued by Impact Theory, LLC (“Impact”) were “securities” under US...more

Ballard Spahr LLP

SEC Finds NFT to Be a Security in Landmark Action

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Summary - The SEC’s focus on the crypto industry expanded this week to include non-fungible tokens (NFTs). In its first NFT-enforcement action, the SEC settled with Impact Theory, a media and entertainment company, over...more

Jones Day

Ripple and Terraform Labs: Two New York District Courts Address the Status of Certain Crypto Assets as Securities

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In Short - The Situation: Recently, two judges in Southern District of New York were required to apply the Howey test in separate cases to decide whether sales of certain crypto assets were investment contracts, and thus...more

Jenner & Block

Client Alert: Ripple, and Terra, and Coinbase, Oh My!

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Three federal judges in the Southern District of New York sit at the center of the long-running battle between the SEC and the crypto industry, overseeing cases that may eventually bring clarity to the industry. After two...more

Kohn, Kohn & Colapinto LLP

SDNY Order Clouds the Water on SEC Crypto Jurisdiction

On July 13th, Judge Analisa Torres of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York entered an order that was quickly celebrated by the crypto world (SEC v. Ripple Labs, Inc., No. 20CIV10832ATSN;...more

Willcox & Savage

Crypto and the SEC v. Ripple Labs, Inc. Decision: What Did the Court Actually Say?

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Earlier this month, a federal trial court judge issued an opinion ruling on whether sales of a digital token, XRP, constituted a “security” for purposes of federal securities laws. Some headlines reporting the ruling have...more

Fenwick & West LLP

SEC v. Ripple Labs: Securities Law Analysis Under Howey Applied On A Transaction-By-Transaction Basis

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It’s the Transaction, Not the Token. Issuers cannot offer or sell securities without registering them with the SEC under Section 5 of the Securities Act of 1933 or finding a valid exemption from registration. XRP is the...more

Polsinelli

“Now Yous Can’t Leave”: SEC Finds Itself in Formidable Fight Over Attempt to Assert Regulatory Domain over Secondary Sales of...

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In July of 2022, the United States Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) each alleged insider trading violations against a former Coinbase employee Ishan Wahi (“Ishan”), his brother...more

Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP

SEC Showcases Lesser-Known Legal Theory in Crypto Lending Suit

The Securities Exchange Commission (“SEC” or “Commission”) has taken action against Genesis Global Capital, LLC (“Genesis”) and Gemini Trust Company, LLC (“Gemini”) (collectively, “Defendants”) in a recently-filed complaint...more

Latham & Watkins LLP

SEC v. Ripple: Approaching Judgment Day

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While a conclusion to the much-hyped case may be approaching, market participants should be wary of doomsday prognostications. As a new year begins, the digital assets industry is still enduring a deep and widespread crypto...more

Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP

Court Rules in Favor of SEC in LBRY Enforcement Action

On November 7, 2022, Judge Paul Barbadoro of the U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire issued an order in SEC v. LBRY, Inc., granting the SEC’s motion for summary judgment against LBRY Inc. (LBRY). The court...more

BakerHostetler

US District Court Finds LBRY Tokens Are Securities

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Takeaways: ..The Court granted the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (the SEC) motion for summary judgment, holding that LBC tokens are securities and that the offers and sales of the tokens by LBRY, Inc. (LBRY)...more

Foley Hoag LLP

SEC and DOJ Bring First-Ever Crypto Insider Trading Actions

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This year had already seen an uptick in federal enforcement activity focused on digital assets with the expansion of the SEC’s Crypto Assets and Cyber Unit (see our prior client alert on that expansion and its impact here)...more

Freeman Law

Five Takeaways from the Enforcement Action against BlockFi Lending, LLC

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Earlier this year, on February 14, 2022, the SEC issued to BlockFi Lending LLC (“BlockFi”), a crypto lending platform, a cease-and-desist order (the “Order”). See BlockFi Lending LLC. The Order prohibits BlockFi from engaging...more

Kohrman Jackson & Krantz LLP

The Sec Had No Love For Blockfi This Valentine’s Day

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has not hesitated to conclude that crypto assets are securities subject to the Securities Act of 1933, but with BlockFi, the SEC went a step further and, for the first time with...more

Eversheds Sutherland (US) LLP

SEC’s latest shot at the crypto industry: BlockFi sanctioned for its unregistered crypto-lending product

There is no love lost between the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the crypto industry with tensions escalating over the past year. So it seems fitting that on Valentine’s Day, the SEC brought a...more

Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP

A Brief Overview of the SEC’s Guidance on Cryptocurrencies in the Context of the Commission’s Enforcement Action Against Ripple...

A key question for any company considering the issuance of cryptocurrency is whether that digital asset will be treated by regulators as a security, like BP stock, or a commodity, like Bitcoin.  In 2019, the Securities and...more

Proskauer - Corporate Defense and Disputes

SEC’s Coinschedule Settlement Offers Mere “Clue-By-Enforcement” Into Whether Cryptocurrencies are Securities

On July 14, 2021 the SEC issued a consented-to Cease and Desist Order against U.K.-based cryptocurrency review website owner Blotics Ltd. (formerly doing business as Coinschedule Ltd.) for violating Section 17(a) of the...more

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