In Monday’s filing with the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, Coinbase included a brief.
Grewal brought attention to the fact that the SEC’s claims are inconsistent and contradictory. According to the attorney, his audience should read the post’s short remarks to see “how defective the Commission’s approach has been.”
As to Grewal’s article, the brief revolved around three main points: the classification of digital assets as a security, the jurisdiction of the SEC over cryptocurrencies, and the precision of the current legislation. In response to these important points, he noted that the SEC has presented conflicting explanations over the years.
Notably, the SEC ruled in 2018 that digital assets do not constitute securities. They contended, however, that a digital asset personifies the “investment contract” in the year 2021. “A digital asset is only computer code.” was their contrasting claim from 2024. The digital asset is an investment contract, as they said before, and they just reaffirmed it five days later.
“Congress provided us a wide framework…to govern exchanges,” the agency said in 2022, while admitting in 2021 that there is no “market regulator for cryptocurrencies.” The SEC purportedly has opposing views on the issue of legal ambiguity as well. In 2020, they conceded that the classification of digital assets as securities is not yet settled, but in 2023, they said, “We have a clear regulatory framework built up over 90 years.”
Aside from restating their prior papers, Coinbase urged the court to compel the SEC to implement an easy and thorough regulatory structure in their brief. In their refusal to establish new cryptographic regulations, the exchange claimed that the authorities were acting arbitrarily and capriciously.
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