Enthusiasm for Atkins

Meanwhile, the industry seems pretty happy about the nomination of Paul Atkins as the next SEC chair.

The big picture: There will soon be a regulator who doesn't automatically look askance at everything anyone wants to do with a blockchain.

• A former SEC commissioner, Atkins has been explicitly critical of regulators stonewalling crypto companies.

Zoom out: While he has his share of critics, praise for Atkins has come from beyond just the blockchain industry.

• John Reed Stark, who has attained his current prominence by being a cheerleader for the Biden SEC, has come out in favor of Atkins as, potentially, the best pick possible.
• Stark goes through a list of 12 reforms he sees as likely at the agency under Atkins.

Zoom in: Stark points out that Atkins goes way, way back with the two other GOP-appointed commissioners.

• Hester Peirce and Mark Uyeda are both thanked for contributions made to a 2008 paper that Atkins wrote when he was a member of the commission (with Brad Bondi, a former attorney with the commission).
• Which means that three of the five commissioners are accustomed to working together.

What we're watching: There's a lot of discourse out there about, "Are crypto tokens securities or not?" It's coming up again in light of what Atkins might do, and it is being raised as an either/or proposition.

💭 Our thought bubble: This is the wrong question. The right question is: How many tokens are securities?

• It seems clear that many coins and tokens would qualify as securities under almost any analysis, but also that there are reasonable arguments that many others are not.
• Or — at least — that they can graduate out of such status (as FIT21 envisions). So! It's more likely that Atkins will forward some kind of guidelines here.

The bottom line: The "facts and circumstances" — as the lawyers say — of these assets are not all the same.