SEC sued Richard Heart in New York because he used a Uniswap fork

The case against Richard Heart was filed in New York because he used Uniswap, and Uniswap developers live in Brooklyn, SEC says

article-image

solarseven/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks

share

A new lawsuit alleging crypto securities violations raises questions about developers’ liability. 

The US Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday sued crypto influencer Richard Schueler, known online as Richard Heart, and three of his projects for allegedly violating securities law. 

The suit was filed in the Eastern District of New York, because, the SEC said in its complaint, “many of the crypto asset transactions described herein took place on Uniswap, a so-called decentralized crypto asset trading platform whose developers are headquartered in Brooklyn.” 

The SEC alleged Schueler “raised more than $1 billion in the unregistered offer and sale of crypto asset securities” through Hex, PulseChain and PulseX, all of which are securities, the SEC said. 

Akash Mahendra, director at Haven1 Foundation and portfolio manager at Yield App, noted that the SEC’s allegations and rationale that has been used to justify the filing of this complaint in the eastern district of New York could set a dangerous precedent. 

In the blockchain world, many projects open source their code base. This means that anyone can copy code, creating an entirely new tool, software or product from it. These are known as forks. 

PulseX is a fork of Uniswap that runs on the PulseChain. 

“Forks, in most cases, run independently of their originating code; therefore, using the originator to justify where legal action should take place is somewhat nonsensical,” Mahendra said. 

Although Uniswap does not have anything to do with the projects under SEC scrutiny, the move to file suit in New York’s eastern district does not come as a surprise to Mahendra, who said the district court has been quite stringent on cryptocurrency matters.

“The SEC likely needs a victory after the very public initial loss of their Ripple case,” Mahendra said. “All in all, the agency is strategizing in its favor but lacks the logic to do so in a favorable light.”


Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:

Tags

Decoding crypto and the markets. Daily, with Byron Gilliam.

Upcoming Events

Old Billingsgate

Mon - Wed, October 13 - 15, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

recent research

Research Report Templates.jpg

Research

Figure, founded by former SoFi CEO Mike Cagney, has emerged as a leader in onchain RWAs, with ~$17.5B publicly tokenized. The platform’s ecosystem volume is growing ~40% YoY as it expands beyond HELOCs into student loans, DSCR loans, unsecured loans, bankruptcy claims, and more. Operationally, Figure cuts average loan production cost by ~93% and compresses median funding time from ~42 days to ~10, creating a durable speed-and-cost advantage.

article-image

The Ethereum co-founder suggested LINEA holders would be eligible for other airdrops in cryptic tweet

article-image

The layer-2’s biggest release yet brings benefits — but a post-upgrade outage caused a chain reorg

article-image

Crypto is shifting into risk-on mode — pump.fun dominates meme activity, while Lido leans on treasury maneuvers

article-image

If the president breaks the Fed, he’ll own the budget problems

article-image

Combining Franklin Templeton’s tokenization expertise with Binance’s trading infrastructure could speed crypto adoption, companies say

article-image

The firm’s upcoming filing comes as competition heats up over the USDH stablecoin