Coinbase CLO Paul Grewal Remains Confident Amid SEC Shenanigans

• Paul Grewal tweeted that his fellow CLOs were “the happiest, most upbeat group of people.”
• The Coinbase CLO declined to share specific information about the gathering he attended at the University of Chicago.
• Grewal criticized the SEC’s impractical proposal to include DEX under its definition of exchanges.

Faced with a combative regulator trying to sue the United States’ cryptocurrency industry into oblivion, one could be forgiven for imagining that top lawyers at Coinbase and Binance must have been feeling the heat this week. Not so, says Coinbase CLO Paul Grewal, who claimed that a June 15 meeting of CLOs at the University of Chicago was “honestly the happiest, most upbeat group of people I’ve joined in a long time.”

In a series of tweets, Grewal remained tight-lipped about who was in attendance, citing the Chatham House Rule, which forbids disclosure of such information. He did, however, thank the dean of the University of Chicago Law School, and assured his followers that “our most important companies are in very capable legal hands.”

Grewal’s company was sued by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for allegedly running an unregistered securities exchange on June 6, the same day he testified before a Congressional committee, urging the government to produce a clear set of regulations for digital assets.  

While the SEC’s lawsuits progress, the Coinbase CLO continues to be a fierce advocate for crypto. On June 15th, he shared a response to the SEC’s proposal to quietly expand the definition of exchanges to include decentralized exchanges (DEX) without notifying the public beforehand. Grewal pointed out that this proposal violates the Administrative Procedure Act, because it is not possible for a DEX to register as an exchange.

The SEC continued to drag its feet this week, flouting a federal court order that demanded a response to Coinbase’s long-standing petition for rulemaking. After ignoring the petition for a year, the SEC was compelled to respond by a writ of mandamus filed by Coinbase. The SEC offered that it had made no decision regarding the petition, and was subsequently accused of being “borderline disrespectful” to the court.