I don't think this is likely to send a signal that the US is "anti-crypto", though I'll have to see the litigation to know for sure.
When ripple was created many people in the cryptocurrency space had or were considering doing something similar and many reached the conclusion that what ripple went on to do would be unambiguously unlawful.
More enforcement can actually send a very positive signal: Lack of enforcement goes on to create a lemon market where bad conduct flourishes. It's extremely difficult to be in business against someone that can bring in billions in funding with almost no real obligations by deceiving unsophisticated members of the public. The lack of enforcement also sends an ambiguous signal that maybe more legitimate efforts will be prosecuted but just haven't yet because they haven't gotten around to it as evidenced by the lack of prosecution of many of the more obviously sketchy efforts.
I don't think they've deceived anyone. It takes <2 minutes of research to figure out that it's a network of financial institutions approved by Ripple controlling their network, as well as their supply schedule details/distribution. Anyone who buys XRP should be expected to figure this out for themselves. The government shouldn't waste tax dollars and resources babying irresponsible people who don't take the time to figure it out before buying.
I can't believe I'm defending Ripple. I think anyone who buys XRP is making a very unwise decision, precisely because the government does ridiculous things like this all the time.
I wish the government wouldn't do things like this and Bitcoin had no use case. But alas, governments will continue to suck.
That may be true today-- years into it, due to a lot of people exposing themselves to enormous amounts of harassment just to get the message out.
It certainly hasn't always been the case.
Could you share the text of an email someone sent you that shows what they weren't aware of?
Edit:
>It's extremely easy for people to fall down the rabit hole of only reading content authored by people pumping it.
I also don't even deny this. But it doesn't excuse the irresponsible decision to buy something without understanding the most critical aspects of what it is and how it works. We should expect people to be responsible when investing, and to be able to do proper research for themselves, and to let them lose their money when they fail to do so. We don't need to waste tax dollars babying and protecting irresponsible investors.
From the article: SEC officials have declared Bitcoin and Ether to be currencies, as they are decentralized in their management, but have left the door open for others to qualify as securities, especially at the time of their issuance.
So not really. The US needs to evolve to the new world.
If a currency crisis arises and the market is frozen, cryptos will not be on the first lien right to trade for Fed assets (whatever that currency might end up to be) or even continue trading, depending on the decisions of the Fed. Hell, I don't expect the issued currency (cash - which the long tail of people are still using) will have that right...since the Fed board members aren't going to be running around with palettes of cash when buying goods either.
BTC has been struggling to push higher for a few days with bearish moves. I'm still a long term bull but I just pulled 100k out, should get a nice discount as it breaks down toward 20k. (I'll average in at anything below 21.)
> Who is the SEC protecting?
JP Morgan and the US e-Dollar.
Or FedCoin as George Hotz called it recently in a Lex Friendman podcast [0].
P.S.: I thought this was an entertaining podcast, George is a funny guy.
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