Original author:Jason
background knowledge
When I talked about the pledge of the exchange, I said that because the unique advantage of the exchange can bring together a large number of user funds to pledge and absorb deposits. At present, the four major institutions Lido, Coinbase, Kraken and Binance basically monopolize the pledge funds. All three are centralized exchanges. The problem with centralization is that the black box has no idea what the pledged money is being used for.https://sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-25 …
This is the SEC's statement on prohibiting Kraken from discontinuing the sale and sale of unregistered encrypted asset pledge services. It has been emphasizing to everyone that you must read first-hand information and not consume second-hand information. First, I saw the SEC saying that Kraken advertised to users that there is an APR of up to 21%. , and I said before that the current APR of POS staking is around 5%, so this promotional figure is simply impossible to achieve
Because the threshold of the exchange pledge model is very low, everyone can participate, there is no supervision in the black box, and the exaggerated income figures, if there is a thunderstorm, this will be the next FTX. From the official document, it can be seen that "bringing together encrypted assets and representing investors Make a pledge... investors lose control.. take risks.. no protection" Finally, it is emphasized that "staking-as-a-service providers must register and provide comprehensive, fair and true investor protection."
So this time the SEC is targeting staking-as-a-service providers and focusing on black-box exchanges. The reason is that the outrageous profit promotion and the high risk of depositors are not within the scope of the attack on native staking or decentralized staking. First of all, it is concluded that what the SEC is doing is not staking, and staking is still alive and well. Don’t be panicked by the rhythm, but it is a mode of absorbing deposits and earning interest in the name of staking services.
Many people are discussing that the reason for being hit is securitization. This is indeed true, otherwise the SEC will not come forward, but as I just emphasized, we must first look at the definition of securitization. The Howey test is the US Supreme Court. A criterion used in a 1946 decision to determine whether a particular transaction constitutes an offering of securities.
There are 4 entries in total:
1. It is an investment of money
2. The generation of expected benefits from the investment;
3. The investment is for a specific business;
4. The generation of interest originates from the issuer or a third party
As long as these four items are passed, it can be regarded as securities, so the current exchange-type pledge service can indeed match these four points, because it is true that retail investors pledge on the exchange is the behavior of money investment to generate interest, but, but here it comes!
To some extent, the original pledge is not an "investment", but a "job". Miners become verification nodes to work and earn their own income. This has nothing to do with investment. I said before that if you want to become a POS miner, you have to go High threshold, you have to run the machine yourself, so it is not considered a "money investment", and the benefits generated do not come from a certain "person", but the chain rewards it.
So from the Howey test, the pledge itself cannot be regarded as a security at all! Now everyone should understand why the SEC wants to "crack down on pledges", where is the scope and boundary of its crackdown, and whether pledges may be securitized. Finally, everyone must read first-hand information and make judgments... Yes For your own DYOR, don't be misled by the remarks that "it's over, staking will be illegal".
