Hmm. They've had several years to inform people of this. Why did they spring this on everyone now?
probably because of the proliferation of security tokens that can't be defined any other way. that's a pretty recent phenomenon.
in the early years, there was just BTC, which most people agree is not a security. the first generation of altcoins were similarly decentralized and open source, and even in the case of (centralized closed source) ripple, it's hard to argue that XRP is some sort of certificate of ownership or derivative contract or that ripple labs issued them with the promise of investor profit.
ethereum was the first ICO. but it's a functioning decentralized cryptocurrency and was never marketed as a security. and it wasn't officially launched until mid-2015. i think that's when this stuff really began hitting the SEC's radar. and it basically takes 1-2 years for the feds to
do anything in general.
now that everybody and their grandma is launching ICOs that are very obviously securities, and (unregistered) exchanges are listing them and allowing US customers to trade them? SEC got no choice but to do something about it.
And I've never in my life heard anyone say 'this place is an exchange ergo it is automatically fully regulated'. Everyone knows they're dodgy shitholes.
you're an old-timer. i remember being much more trusting of exchanges in 2013 than i am now. and honestly, years ago, newcomers were usually people with some basic technical knowledge or real interest in markets. newcomers today are dumber than ever. total plebs trying to get rich quick.
I wonder when we're going to get a comprehensive list of which coins are securities and which are not. They're going to have to definitively outline that to enforce things properly.
they'll never do that. not in a million years. that's not how regulators work, at least not in america. they usually fine and/or litigate against parties but don't offer explicit guidance on how to properly comply. then everyone tries to interpret the case to see what the SEC's position is. they never give explicit guidance, only general.
the best we get is things like the munchee ICO. basically, don't do what munchee did, because that'll get you shut down, fined, maybe even imprisoned. but that tells us nothing about how to properly comply. it just tells us what
not to do.