Security tokens refer to the digitalization of securities under the Capital Markets Act using distributed ledger technology, according to the guidance, and will apply only to digital assets that qualify. The guidance clarifies that stablecoins, which are crypto pegged to the value of other currencies such as the U.S. dollar and are used for payments or as a medium of exchange, will likely not fall under the definition of securities. Digital assets that have no issuer and do not have to “fulfill the obligations commensurate with the investor’s rights,” will also likely fall outside of the scope of security tokens.

“Startups were able to raise uncharacteristically sized rounds for their stage, commonly acquiring multiple years of runway pre-product, while over the course of the last six months, investors pivoted to underwriting fewer deals targeting higher conviction, more concentrated bets,” George told CoinDesk in a note. “During this period of time, investors began to re-evaluate their focus on what constitutes product market fit, realizing that large token incentive programs rewarding user participation creates distorted traction metrics and overlooks user stickiness.”

“I think that given the events of the last fall, we were very mindful of the need to implement a lot of the safeguards that were called for in the FSOC reports, things like segregating customer assets, getting additional visibility into vertically integrated firms, cracking down conflicts of interest, addressing spot market jurisdiction and that’s a long list. But I think they’re all part and parcel of how we make sure we’ll be protecting consumers and supporting financial stability,” the official said.

The claim alleges that the developers owe “fiduciary duties” and “duties in tort” to re-write or amend protocol code in order to give Wright access to 111,000 bitcoin (BTC) from two wallets whose private keys were allegedly stolen and subsequently erased in a hack. One of the wallets Wright claims to own, the 1Feex wallet, holds nearly 80,000 BTC associated with the hack of Mt. Gox – the Tokyo-based bitcoin exchange that went bankrupt after a series of hacks between 2011 and 2014. His ownership of those coins is, as such, contested.

On Twitter, in response to the 20,000 MKR being allocated to fight climate change, Moneysupply.eth, a risk analyst and governance contributor for several decentralized protocols, including MakerDAO, wrote, “So here’s a contrarian take: I am not convinced this specific initiative is the best path forward but [decentralized finance] desperately needs to start winning the battle for public opinion, the alternative is all of us in jail and the rest of the world buying their bug rations with cbdc [central bank digital currencies].”

Already a bull on MicroStrategy, Canaccord Genuity upped its price target on the stock to $400 from $372 following the news. “We believe the company’s relatively conservative strategy of keeping most of its holdings unencumbered has been prudent,” wrote analyst Joseph Vafi and team. “Institutional investors are continuing to work on their Bitcoin and overall digital-asset strategies, in our view. As such, we expect to see continued mainstream adoption, which we believe bode well for the medium term and supports our view that BTC is biased higher over time.”

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Ether fared similarly on the day, dipping late to also fall 1.8% from Wednesday, same time. The second largest crypto in market value was recently changing hands near $1,650. Other major cryptos declined late in the day to flatten or also drop into negative territory. APT, the token of layer 1 blockchain Aptos, plunged 6.5% to lose some of the ground it has gained this year. APT rose more than any other token in January. GALA, the token of the Gala Games play-to-earn platform declined 5%. The CoinDesk Market Index, a measure of the crypto market’s performance, was recently down 1.8%.

Please note that our privacy policy, terms of use, cookies, and do not sell my personal information has been updated.

The leader in news and information on cryptocurrency, digital assets and the future of money, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups. As part of their compensation, certain CoinDesk employees, including editorial employees, may receive exposure to DCG equity in the form of stock appreciation rights, which vest over a multi-year period. CoinDesk journalists are not allowed to purchase stock outright in DCG.

Battle lines were drawn when the Ordinals protocol, which stores non-fungible tokens on the Bitcoin, launched on the dominant blockchain last month. That showdown created two factions – purists who insist on using bitcoin (BTC) exclusively for payments and Ordinals fans who welcome NFTs, including this “Taproot wizard” sketch that nearly filled an entire 4 megabyte (MB) block, incurred no transaction fees (although a premium off-chain fee was likely paid) and left Bitcoiners of both stripes mystified.