Block.one announces settlement with U.S. SEC for EOS token sale

Block.One, the company building EOSIO, announced today a settlement with U.S. Securities and the Exchange Commission (SEC) for an unregistered sale of EOS tokens. Block.one will pay a one-time fine of US$24 million.

Additionally, the SEC has also granted Block.one with an important waiver so that Block.one will not be subject to certain ongoing restrictions that would usually apply with settlements of this type.

The settlement with SEC relates specifically to the EOS ERC-20 token sold on the Ethereum blockchain during the period June 26, 2017, and June 1, 2018. Since the earlier ERC-20 token is no longer in circulation, the firm does not require registration of token as a security with the SEC.

Following SEC press release, The Block.one issued the following statement: “We are excited to resolve these discussions with the SEC and are committed to ongoing collaboration with regulators and policymakers as the world continues to develop more clarity around compliance frameworks for digital assets”.

Recently formed Crypto Rating Council rated EOS as 3.75 i.e. relatively high likelihood of EOS token as a security. The rating serves as a guide for crypto-financial firms like exchanges or investment management firms to determine if to provide services for the cryptocurrency asset in question.

Hopefully, this settlement provides regulatory clarity to the U.S. crypto-financial firms like Coinbase, Circle etc and they consider providing the trading or custody services for EOS tokens in their platform.