Bitcoin, Blackrock & The SEC: All You Need To Know!

If you haven’t heard the latest crypto news, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is taking legal action against Binance and Coinbase, two of the largest centralised cryptocurrency exchanges in the world.

 

Which means the FUD narrative is in overdrive!

 

Are we facing another battle in the war against crypto? And is there any good news for everyday investors?

 

Let’s find out.

 

What’s Happened So Far
The SEC is a US body that have swung their regulatory hammer right down onto two of the biggest crypto exchanges – Binance and Coinbase. The lawsuits are separate, but they both involve accusations of offering unregistered securities to the general public.

 

It was also announced that 13 major cryptocurrencies will potentially be reclassified from assets to securities, essentially changing the way they can be bought, sold and exchanged. Panic ensued and we witnessed huge sell-offs of some very popular coins (Dogecoin and Solana among them).

 

If the SEC lawsuits are successful, they could force crypto companies to register their coins with a central governing body… which goes against everything crypto stands for.

 

So, as you can see, this is quite an interesting story!

 

However, like any good story, there are a few twists and turns….

 

Enter Blackrock

If you haven’t heard of Blackrock, they’re one of the largest investment firms on the planet.

 

How big exactly?

 

They have a whopping $10 trillion under management.

 

Blackrock have filed an application that allows them to track the value of Bitcoin and trade it on traditional market exchanges (rather than crypto ones). It’s called a Bitcoin ETF (Exchange-Traded Fund) and it lets investors buy Bitcoin without actually holding it in their own wallet that they control.

 

Which kind of defeats the whole purpose, don’t you think?

 

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As we know, Bitcoin exists so that ordinary people can have complete control of their funds without having to go through a central governing body. But now we have major traditional financial institutions coming in while the SEC clamps down on the easiest ways for retail investors to enter the crypto space?

 

Interesting timing, to say the least!

 

If the Blackrock ETF is approved (which is highly likely given they have a near-perfect track record of EFT approval), it opens the door for other major institutions to follow suit and gain exposure to Bitcoin without actually owning it. This has already started, with Invesco (another big institution and others) applying for their own Bitcoin ETF).

 

So, Is There Any Good News Here?
I’ll be honest, at first glance, it doesn’t look particularly great. In fact it looks like the big players are washing everyday investors out of the market through fear tactics, then buying the dip to pump it back up.

 

But does it spell the end for crypto as we know it?

 

Absolutely not. If anything, it simply confirms a long-held truth:

 

Crypto isn’t going anywhere soon.

 

If you look past the fear narrative about crypto being dead in the water, it seems the exact opposite is now playing out.

 

We’ve always known crypto is a threat to big institutions and they’d want to get their fingers in the pie in one way or another. Now we know the play: Reduce the means for everyday investors to buy and hold their own crypto while making it easier for large institutions to do it on their behalf.

 

So the same financial big guns who’ve been shouting from the rooftops that it’s a scam, are now clambering over themselves to get involved!

 

Some are calling it a necessary evil – that if there’s ever going to be mass adoption of cryptocurrencies, there needs to be an alternative to self-custody.

 

But my opinion?

 

All this is just pointing us more and more in the direction of decentralised finance and decentralised exchanges.

 

The situation is unfolding, and there are financial shenanigans at play, as there always is (the FTX fiasco is one example of this). But if I can offer one suggestion, it’s to investigate decentralised exchanges and get comfortable using them. This will ensure we always have a means to invest, trade and buy crypto, no matter what the big corporations decide to do.

 

Lastly, I encourage you to always remember the golden rule of crypto: Always keep your funds in a wallet that you control.

 

If you’re reading this, you’re already well ahead of the curve. I’ve said before that we are still early adopters, so we’ll experience the most volatility, but also the biggest gains. So keep educating yourself and remember why cryptocurrencies were invented in the first place – to give the power back to the people.