The SEC updated its crypto FAQs on how securities laws apply to token issuers, days after the Senate failed to advance the CLARITY Act. The move follows similar staff guidance from the CFTC last week, while SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce announced her resignation effective Oct. 2.
The SEC updated its policies on how securities laws apply to certain crypto assets and transactions involving them, matching a similar move the CFTC made last week. It issued the update on Friday, revising the crypto FAQs it first published in March.
Guidance targets buybacks and staking tokens
The SEC said the new interpretation was non-binding and created no additional legal obligations for any person. The FAQs address how the agency applies the Howey test to digital asset products.
According to the SEC: "a crypto system is functional and has no central party" — a condition under which token issuers running buyback programs would not necessarily be making a promise of managerial effort under securities law. The SEC extended similar reasoning to crypto networks, saying a functional system where services merely secure, maintain, or improve the network would not necessarily meet the Howey standard either. Staking receipt tokens, the agency added, would not always qualify as securities.
Both regulators act after Congress stalls
The SEC and CFTC released their staff guidance within days of each other, after the Senate failed to pass a crypto market structure bill that many had expected to clarify the roles the two regulators would have over digital assets. SEC Chair Paul Atkins and CFTC Chair Michael Selig both issued statements signaling their agencies would address crypto regulation without new legislation from Congress.
Peirce departure narrows SEC leadership
Commissioner Hester Peirce, who has served at the SEC for eight years and earned the nickname "Crypto Mom" for her advocacy of crypto-friendly policy, announced on Friday that she plans to resign on Oct. 2. She is expected to join Regent University's law school in Virginia as an associate professor in November.
Her departure leaves Chair Atkins and Commissioner Mark Uyeda, both Republicans, running a panel normally made up of five bipartisan members. As of Monday, President Donald Trump had not named replacements for Peirce or the commission's two vacant Democratic seats.
Source: Cointelegraph
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