10 Comments
Jun 12·edited Jun 12Liked by Molly White

Coinbase (and Binance) are going to go through some "things"

I will need more popcorn

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Jun 13Liked by Molly White

Thank you for cutting through all the BS. The Coinbase arguments are so so weak, and as you point out, the company undermined them in its IPO filing. Not surprised Coinbase is finding some allies in Congress. Congress members come pretty cheap these days, especially the wackadoddles.

One question: why isn’t bitcoin a security?

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The arguments here are too rational; I don’t think crypto people would really grasp them. If a person dispassionately looks at the issue then I think it makes sense why Coinbase deserves its fate. With crypto-rose-colored glasses however, the Armstrong and Paul Grewal arguments are just assumed to be right at face value - no interrogation or questioning needed. Even with Binance, they’re just completely indifferent that the company trades against them. I guess it’s easier to just say “the U.S. hates crypto”, or what ever specious conspiracy theory is easy to digest in sound bites and short tweets.

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Jun 12Liked by Molly White

The heroin comparison is actually what happened to the Sackler family.

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The SEC apparently left CoinBase no choice but to sue for clarity.

Public article:

https://www.coindesk.com/policy/2023/07/31/sec-asked-coinbase-to-stop-trading-in-all-cryptocurrencies-other-than-bitcoin-before-suing-report/

> “They came back to us, and they said . . . we believe every asset other than bitcoin is a security,” Armstrong said according to the FT. “And, we said, well how are you coming to that conclusion, because that’s not our interpretation of the law. And they said, we’re not going to explain it to you, you need to delist every asset other than bitcoin.”

> Armstrong said the SEC recommendation left us no choice but to head to court.

> The SEC told the FT its enforcement division did not make formal requests for “companies to delist crypto assets.”

But wait. Didn’t nearly all top SEC personnel say that Ethereum is not a security?

Hinman and SEC pushing him to say it: https://blockworks.co/news/sec-hinman-eth-not-security

SEC chair Gary Gensler: https://decrypt.co/138334/gary-gensler-sec-ethereum-not-security-mit-2018?amp=1

SEC prev chair Jay Clayton: https://finance.yahoo.com/amphtml/news/us-sec-chairman-jay-clayton-175300070.html

Hester Pierce “crypto mom” ironically has never explicitly stated a position on Ethereum

What are they going to do now, backtrack on their own public statements?

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Actually, the judge in the case has BOUGHT these CoinBase arguments. Here is Meet Kevin discussing the judge’s own comments — you should look into what the judge said about these arguments Molly! https://youtu.be/wr4vgQP-0gk

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