Origins of Cryptocurrency Prohibition
Introduction
This is Part II of a series of articles that addresses the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”)’s suppression of cryptocurrency, or what we call private digital money (“PDM”).
1 Part I introduced the SEC’s sleight of hand in its anti-cryptocurrency efforts and sources the Agency uses to claim jurisdiction over cryptocurrencies. In Part II, we discuss specific parts of the SEC’s history of suppressing PDM.
As we noted in Part I, the SEC’s program has ignored the jurisdictional limitation imposed on the agency, which is that the SEC can become involved only when a security is sold or transferred; if what is sold is not a security or related to one, then the SEC lacks authority to regulate it. PDM is not a security and, unless the entire conception of security is stretched beyond recognition, it never will be a security. But an agency’s exerted administrative power can obviously exceed its actual authority unless the over-reach is reined in by the courts or by an internally-directed change of direction by its leadership.