Binance lawsuit: 61 cryptocurrencies are now seen as securities by the SEC
The total number of cryptocurrencies the United States securities regulator has accused to be a “security” has now reached an estimated 61, after adding a few more from its lawsuit against crypto exchange Binance.
The 61 cryptocurrencies accused obeing a “security” comes from years of various litigation undertaken by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) which has outlined what cryptocurrencies it deems securities.
In its most recent case against Binance, the SEC introduced 10 cryptocurrencies into the securities classification: BNB (BNB), Binance USD (BUSD), Solana (SOL), Cardano (ADA), Polygon (MATIC), Cosmos (ATOM), The Sandbox (SAND), Decentraland (MANA), Axie Infinity (AXS) and COTI (COTI).
Today we charged Binance Holdings Ltd. (Binance); U.S.-based affiliate, BAM Trading Services Inc., which, together with Binance, operates https://t.co/swcxioZKVP; and their founder, Changpeng Zhao, with a variety of securities law violations.https://t.co/H1wgGgR5ir pic.twitter.com/IWTb7Et86H
— U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (@SECGov) June 5, 2023
Other notable cryptocurrencies the SEC has deemed securities are Ripple’s XRP (XRP), LBRY’s LBRY Credits (LBC), although not for secondary sales and Algorand (ALGO) which it named alongside five others when it charged Bittrex in April.
The SEC’s largest one-time lumping of cryptocurrencies came when it charged Terraform Labs with fraud in February. A total of 16 crypto assets were labeled securities inclusive of Terra Luna Classic (LUNC), Terra Classic USD (USTC), Mirror Protocol (MIR) and an estimated 13 Mirrored Assets (mAssets) which aimed to copy the price of stocks such as Apple and Tesla.
Related: Fines and regulation: The ever-growing landscape of crypto compliance
The SEC’s litigated remit of the crypto space means it now covers over $100 billion worth of the market or around 10% of the $1.09 trillion total crypto market capitalization.
SEC chair Gary Gensler, however, has claimed “everything other than Bitcoin” is a security that falls under the agency’s remit. Crypto data site CoinMarketCap lists around 25,500 cryptocurrencies in existence.
SEC-deemed crypto ‘securities’
XRP (XRP), Telegram’s Gram (TON), LBRY Credits (LBC), OmiseGo (OMG), DASH (DASH), Algorand (ALGO), Naga (NGC), Monolith (TKN), IHT Real Estate (IHT), Power Ledger (POWR), Kromatica (KROM), DFX Finance (DFX), Amp (AMP), Rally (RLY), Rari Governance Token (RGT), DerivaDAO (DDX), XYO Network (XYO), Liechtenstein Cryptoasset Exchange (LCX), Kin (KIN) Salt Lending (SALT), Beaxy Token (BXY), DragonChain (DRGN), Tron (TRX), BitTorrent (BTT), Terra USD (UST), Luna (LUNA), Mirror Protocol (MIR), Mango (MNGO), Ducat (DUCAT), Locke (LOCKE), EthereumMax (EMAX), Hydro (HYDRO), BitConnect (BCC), Meta 1 Coin (META1), Filecoin (FIL), BNB (BNB), Binance USD (BUSD), Solana (SOL), Cardano (ADA), Polygon (MATIC), Cosmos (ATOM), The Sandbox (SAND), Decentraland (MANA), Axie Infinity (AXS), COTI (COTI), Paragon (PRG), AirToken (AIR).
Mirror Protocol mAssets: Mirrored Apple Inc. (mAAPL), Mirrored Amazon.com, Inc. (mAMZN), Mirrored Alibaba Group Holding Limited (mBABA), Mirrored Alphabet Inc. (mGOOGL), Mirrored Microsoft Corporation (mMSFT), Mirrored Netflix, Inc. (mNFLX), Mirrored Tesla, Inc. (mTSLA), Mirrored Twitter Inc. (mTWTR), Mirrored iShares Gold Trust (mIAU), Mirrored Invesco QQQ Trust (mQQQ), Mirrored iShares Silver Trust (mSLV), Mirrored United States Oil Fund, LP (mUSO), Mirrored ProShares VIX Short-Term Futures ETF (mVIXY).
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