>but basically until Stox proves that it isn't a security, then securities regulations apply
That's not how it works.
That's not how it works.
So while it's not true it's a fairly good starting point for a group to take when they float securities looking item.
The investigative report they released [1] is quite informative, and suggests to me that the vast majority of tokens being traded and sold do not meet the SEC's definition of a security. Mind you, I'm not a lawyer, so take what I say with a grain of salt.
Exchanges have to have assurances that they are not securities, otherwise they may retroactively be sanctioned as unregistered broker-dealers. For the traders themselves, securities are subject to insider trading logic which doesn't apply to non-securities. It is a tough landscape, and creating a legal basis for not being a security is a prerequisite, for now.
When actual broker-dealers (like TD Ameritrade, ETrade etc) start trading tokenized securities offerings, it will be extremely advantageous because they have much more robust infrastructure and trillions of dollars of assets under management already. So people that register their tokenized offerings as securities now may have the first mover advantage in the future for attracting liquidity, but a big disadvantage now.
Maybe. But maybe in the long run, the regulated industry, as encumbered by regulatory friction as it is (e.g. $10 per trade), is a dinosaur, and will be thoroughly eclipsed by this new unregistered blockchain token market with its nearly frictionless transactions.