SEC Approval Not Needed Says Coinbase, XRP & XLM Still Unlikely To Be Added

Leading cryptocurrency exchange desk Coinbase has recently closed off a trio of acquisitions that allowed the business to trade security tokens after they announced that they were been granted the ‘stamp of approval’ from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Rachel Horowitz, a spokeswoman for Coinbase, has explained that the company was never given an approval from the company to continue with the buyout of the Venovate Marketplace, Digital Wealth and Keystone Capital buyout deals. In the end, it turned out that they never needed one either as the permission from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) was more than enough. Despite the exchange unofficially consulting with members of the SEC, Horowitz said:

“It is not correct to say that the SEC and FINRA approved Coinbase’s Purchase of Keystone because SEC was not involved in the approval process… SEC’s approval is not required for the change of control application.”

The verification was seconded by Kyle Samani, managing partner at Multicoin Capital, who commented that there aren’t any legal ‘roadblocks’ stopped Coinbase from listing security token. Nevertheless, Samani believes that the exchange is unlikely to engage in the trade of unregistered securities. Samani tweeted saying:

“For all the people still hoping Coinbase will list XLM or XRP. Yes, Coinbase can trade securities. Legally. But. They aren’t going to trade unregistered securities.

Furthermore, the acquisitions also mean that Coinbase will be provided with licenses to work as a broker dealer, legitimate investment advisors, and alternate trading systems. On Monday a spokesman for Coinbase said:

“Being approved to take ownership of these licensed entities is one more step toward our ultimate goal of allowing our customers to trade securities token on our platform. There are many more steps and conversations needed with regulators before this journey’s is complete.”

This is an interesting time for Coinbase, and the buyouts seem to just add to that. The exchange has recently revealed that they are thinking about extending the list of cryptocurrencies they support. Currently, the supported currencies include, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum Classic, Litecoin, Cardano, Basic Attention Token, Stellar, Zcash, 0x and of course, Bitcoin. With all of this taken into consideration, it seems clear that Coinbase had security tokens on the table all along. Once regulators work out which cryptocurrencies will be under security laws, who knows what will happen. One thing is for sure, Coinbase looks like it’s heading into security token trading in the near future.