Solana, others caught in SEC crackdown ‘don’t deserve it,’ Buterin says
A little less a month after Binance and Coinbase were sued, Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin defends rival chains that have been targeted
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin | Alexey Smyshlyaev/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks
Ethereum creator Vitalik Buterin has finally weighed in on the US approach to crypto regulation.
Buterin shared his thoughts on the matter early Friday morning through a Twitter ask me anything (AMA). Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang asked him, “How are you feeling about the US policy approach to crypto?”
Buterin responded with sympathy for his blockchain counterparts that are in US regulators’ crosshairs, naming Solana in particular. He seemingly also acknowledged Ethereum’s somewhat privileged position.
“The one comment I’ll make is that I feel bad that @solana and other projects are getting hit in this way. They don’t deserve it, and if ethereum ends up ‘winning’ through all other blockchains getting kicked off exchanges, that’s not an honorable way to win, and in the long term probably isn’t even a victory,” Buterin tweeted.
He said he doesn’t consider other chains, such as Solana, to be the real competition. The true threat, he said, is “the rapidly expanding centralized world that is imposing itself on us.”
Solana (SOL) was deemed a security in the SEC suits against both Binance and Coinbase. And so were cardano (ADA), Polygon’s token MATIC, filecoin (FIL), the Sandbox’s SAND, and Axie Infinity (AXS).
Ether went untouched in the SEC’s crackdown, and even for casual observers, this wasn’t surprising.
When SEC Chair Gary Gensler testified before the House Financial Services Committee in April, he refused to give a definite answer on whether ether was a security or a commodity.
And a little over a month before Gensler’s congressional appearance, CFTC Chair Rostin Behnam was a bit clearer on where ether stood, since his agency has already allowed the trading of ether futures products.
“I’ve made the argument that ether is a commodity,” Behnam told senators in March. “It’s been listed on CFTC exchanges for quite some time.”
He continued, “We would not have allowed the product – in this case the ether futures product – to be listed on a CFTC exchange if we did not feel strongly that it was a commodity asset because we have litigation risk.”
The first regulator to claim ether is a security was New York Attorney General Letitia James, though her view hasn’t gained much traction.
Get the news in your inbox. Explore Blockworks newsletters:
- Blockworks Daily: Unpacking crypto and the markets.
- Empire: Crypto news and analysis to start your day.
- Forward Guidance: The intersection of crypto, macro and policy.
- 0xResearch: Alpha directly in your inbox.
- Lightspeed: All things Solana.
- The Drop: Apps, games, memes and more.
- Supply Shock: Bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.
