Lawyer Calls Out the SEC Over ‘Weird’ Crypto Regulations

• James Murphy called the SEC’s approach to crypto regulation “weird.”
• Murphy added that the crypto sector is too big to be mentioned in footnotes.
• The market cap of the crypto space stands at $2.1 trillion.

Prominent lawyer focused on cryptocurrencies, James Murphy, also known as MetaLawMan across his social media handles, took shots at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its “weird” approach towards the regulation of digital assets in the country. 

In a post on social media platform X (previously known as Twitter), Murphy talked about the footnotes in the Binance vs. the SEC lawsuit wherein the regulator said that it “regrets” any confusion that it might have stirred by terming cryptocurrencies as securities. The agency then added that by securities it meant the “full set of contracts, expectations, and understandings centered on the sales and distribution” of a virtual asset.

Read also: MetaLawMan Criticizes the SEC’s Disgorgement Filling

According to the data from CoinMarketCap, the crypto sector has a total market cap of $2.1 trillion, a 3% surge in the past 24 hours with Bitcoin (BTC) dominating the industry with a valuation of $1.18 trillion. Meanwhile, Ether (ETH), the second-largest digital asset, has a market cap of $291 billion. Murphy emphasized that the digital asset sector is too large to be only mentioned in the footnotes of a legal document. The lawyer added:

“Maybe it’s just me, but dropping hints in footnotes seems like a weird way to regulate an enormous industry with millions of investors & billions in daily trading.”

On the other hand, Dan Thurman, a prominent XRP bull, pointed out that most companies put some of their most vital details in the footnotes of their quarterly financial disclosures, implying that the SEC might soon discuss the classification of cryptocurrencies as securities and explain its standing on the asset class.

Coinbase CLO Slams the SEC

Coinbase’s legal chief, Paul Grewal, also slammed the SEC for its repeated classification of cryptocurrencies as securities and then, contradicting its own statement in the footnotes during the Binance lawsuit. 

The SEC named ten cryptocurrencies that it considers securities in the Binance lawsuit including SOL, ADA, MATIC, FIL, ATOM, SAND, MANA, ALGO, AXS, and COTI. Grewal questioned why Ethereum wasn’t in the list, accusing the regulator of misleading the court.