Several pro-crypto voices spoke out against Wells’ Notice issued to NFT marketplace OpenSea on August 28, as the SEC’s broad crackdown continued unchecked.
OpenSea was appointed next on the Securities and Exchange Commission’s list just a week after Democratic candidate Kamala Harris was reportedly opening up to adopting crypto-friendly policies.
The SEC’s Wells Notice suggests that OpenSea could be sued for violating federal securities laws by facilitating sales of non-fungible tokens or digital collectibles through its on-chain trading store.
OpenSea launched in 2017 and gained traction in 2020/2021 during the NFT boom. Many compared digital art collections on the NFT market to baseball and Pokémon trading cards, but with web3-inspired art issued on decentralized networks like Ethereum (Ethnicity).
SEC members are clowns who take the idiotic position that digital art magically becomes a security when placed on a blockchain.
Hayden Adams, CEO of Uniswap
While OpenSea pledged to offer a $5 million legal relief package to creators, MonkeDAO attorney Ariel Givner calmed fears of direct litigation against individual artists. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong expressed an optimistic outlook on cryptocurrency operators being scrutinized by the SEC.
The industry chorus condemned the move as another “regulation by enforcement” move by the SEC, under Chairman Gary Gensler, who, according to multiple pro-crypto figures, should be dismissedSpeculators also pointed out that OpenSea’s Wells notice was published less than a day after former President Donald Trump launched his fourth NFT collection.
The news did little to improve Harris’s odds on Polymarket, as Trump took the lead by 1%. Bets on who will win the 2024 presidential election remain a toss-up on the Polygon-based prediction market. News of another SEC crackdown on crypto may strain already tense relations between a potential Harris presidency and an industry that has spent $119 million in lobbying in 2024.
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