- The Ethereum co-founder said so in an interview with CNBC
- He referred to William Hinman’s 2018 statement and the CFTC’s position
- He believes this gives some “legal protection” to ether
CEO Consensys and Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin said he has no concerns regarding the regulatory definition of ether. According to him, the SEC has long given its assessment of the asset, classifying it as a commodity.
Lubin said this during an interview for CNBC. You can read this moment at the link.
In his statement, Lubin appeals to Hinman’s statement in 2018. Who is this guy? William Hinman is a former employee of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
In 2018, he publicly stated that ETH and several other crypto-assets are commodities. It was on his assessment, for example, that Ripple built its entire line of defense in court against the regulator.
With this in mind, the company was granted the right to release documents. And judging by its CEO’s statement, that could be a strong case for the firm.
Also during the interview, Lubin stressed that the CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) has also repeatedly referred to ether as a commodity. This will provide the asset with some “legal protection” from possible pressure from the SEC.
Reminder, the regulator designated several dozen tokens as securities in a lawsuit against Binance. You can read about the list in our story.
An interesting fact – the SEC “quietly” removed information about William Hinman from its website. Apparently they’re not too happy that the former employee’s statement goes against the regulator’s course.