In a hearing yesterday before the House Appropriations Committee, SEC Chairman Jay Clayton was asked by Congressman Stewart to clarify his view on how regulatory oversight of cryptocurrencies could be split between the SEC and CFTC. He responded:
It’s a complicated area. Because, as you said, there are different types of cryptoassets. Let me try and divide them into two areas. A pure medium of exchange, the one that’s most often cited, is Bitcoin. As a replacement for currency, that has been determined by most people to not be a security.
Then there are tokens, which are used to finance projects. I’ve been on the record saying there are very few, there’s none that I’ve seen, tokens that aren’t securities. To the extent something is a security, we should regulate it as a security, and our securities regulations are disclosure-based, and people should follow those and provide the information that we require.
This is the clearest indication yet that the SEC does not view Bitcoin as a security. Though that may seem like a settled question to the cryptocurrency community, the commodity status of Bitcoin has not yet been set in stone by U.S. regulators.
We have seen some members of Congress suggest that Bitcoin be treated as a security, something we have argued against for years, so it is reassuring that the head of the SEC does not seem to believe that is appropriate.
Here’s video of the exchange: