- The SEC is to open a crypto filings office within its Division of Corporation Finance
- The new office was announced at a legal conference in Washington last night
- Few details are known at this stage, but no one in the crypto space will be getting too excited
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is planning to open a new office for cryptocurrency filings in a move that represents the agency’s first genuine effort to help with regulating the space. The news was revealed by Cicely LaMothe, Associate Director for Disclosure Operations within the Division of Corporation Finance which will house the new office, an entity that handles disclosures for publicly traded firms. While this may be considered good news, the proof will be in the pudding as the SEC has made similar promises before, with no end product.
New Office Will Address “Unique and Evolving” Crypto Market
LaMothe broke the news last night at a legal conference in Washington, saying that the SEC sees the new office as necessary to address the “unique and evolving” issues around crypto assets and the filing of them.
As we know all too well, the SEC considers almost all cryptocurrencies securities, with the exception of Bitcoin and Ethereum, although the latter is still the subject of an internal tug of war for SEC Chair Gary Gensler.
Not the SEC’s First Rodeo
Not many details were provided by LaMothe over the new office, but it’s not worth getting too excited about what it might mean. The SEC announced in December 2020 that the Strategic Hub for Innovation and Financial Technology, commonly referred to as FinHub, would evolve to act as a bridge between crypto projects and the agency, with Stephen D. Palley, Partner at Anderson Kill, saying at the time that FinHub’s new role “hopefully encourages innovators to take prudent steps to engage with SEC staff while working in the heavily regulated securities space.”
This, clearly, hasn’t happened, and instead the SEC has been accused of trying to regulate through enforcement. Whether this new office makes any difference will only be known when more details emerge, but no one in the crypto space will be holding their breath.
