Are the SEC regulations helpful for ICO consumers, or would it be better to focus on preventing fraud?

Gary Bernstein
2 min readMay 3, 2018

--

There was recently this conversation in US politics: #SEC Official Says ICO Regulation Should Be ‘Balanced’, Congressman Suggests Ban https://cointelegraph.com/news/us-sec-official-says-ico-regulation-should-be-balanced-congressman-suggests-ban

It’s likely that any such outright ban of #crypto, #ICO or #STO would go to the Supreme Court. Firstly, #cryptocurrencies are technically text messages, and argues that banning them would violate the first amendment, and be a futile step against technological and political progress.

Information technology has always driven #political progress forward. Writing and the Code of Laws took humanity out of despotism. Freedom of information and collaboration via the printing press and the internet enabled and expanded democracy.

The original purpose of the SEC, formed in #1933, during the Great Depression, against fraud, may be maintained without such a ban, with an adjusted simplified guideline for tokenized securities, some of which can be supported more automatically and transparently by code contracts, such as standard #ERC 884.

ICO #technology can streamline SEC processes to maintain the spirit of the law while unleashing citizens entrepreneurial spirit, unburdened by the high costs of undergoing regulations, which can cost millions of dollars. It can also help the SEC check for fraud in more efficient ways, catching large numbers of bad actors rather than trying to scare people away. The latter approach tends to favor bad actors.

Contrary to statements from some #politicians, ICO companies contribute to the economy in significant ways. ICO companies pay employees and a myriad of service providers — real people — real money for their work, ultimately, or nothing would ever get done. People have bills and taxes to pay. Take away the #ICOs and you take away those jobs.

The cost / benefit of ICO bans needs to be remembered. ICO companies can simply take their companies out of the USA and other countries will benefit from hosting their ecosystems and #technologies of the future, while the USA would be left behind, instead of leading the free world. Nations compete to create friendly #business environments. Those who lack it will be left with fewer jobs and #investment opportunities.

It’s possible to help protect against fraud while expanding the array of consumable investments on the shelf.

CoTrader is a marketplace where investors can choose fund managers whose performance is incontrovertibly proven on the blockchain, because the trades happen on the blockchain — on decentralized exchanges (#DEXs). CoTrader may be the world’s first ICO futures platform, since each fund has its own token shares that are instantly liquid on the CoTrader #DEX. CoTrader tools to facilitate and expedite global fund management and legal compliance in this freer more borderless economy will lead to tremendous new growth.

Join us on cotrader.com

Telegram t.me/cotrader.com

I spoke about these issues at the “State of Cryptocurrency Hedge Funds” event at #Harvard University

--

--

Responses (34)