Bitcoin Today: SEC and ICOs

Price
Today the market is trading sideways after the recent fall. Level 6250.0, the upper bound of the main resistive zone, has managed to stop the falling. Nonetheless, the price has not yet won back even a half of the fall, so that the market bias stays bearish with high probability if further fall. Main levels for today are 6250.0 from below, a breakthrough of which will lead the price to the year low at 5750, and 6450 from above as the half of the fall.

Today forecast
Today most probable trading diapason: 6000 - 6450. High downward risk.

Latest news

SEC hunting for ICOs, is it a good thing?
Recently Yahoo Finance published an article about the last doings of SEC in a field of ICOs.
Over the past few months, the American Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has significantly strengthened its efforts to account companies, which at one time attracted funding through initial offers of coins (ICO).
As you know, in early 2018, the SEC launched a large-scale investigation into the ICO sphere, sending a number of companies an invitation to “talk”. A few months later, the department not only returned to studying the issue but also sent similar notifications to many other startups. The main claims of the SEC come down to the fact that these companies were not able to properly ensure that only accredited investors participate in the ICO.
Later it turned out that several dozens of companies, not giving these circumstances to wide publicity, agreed to return the funds to investors and pay a fine. At the same time, other startups claim to be in limbo, not understanding how they can still meet the requirements of the SEC and how others solve these issues.
The names of the interlocutors, some of whom are employees of companies under investigation, and some of them are lawyers, are not disclosed, since all of them are limited by the SEC in disclosing information and for this reason spoke on the rights of anonymity.
ICO, as an alternative to venture capital investments, has reached the peak of its popularity in 2017, but most companies have not yet launched work products.
The exact figures on how much the ICO has been conducted in recent years, however, differ. Thus, ICO Alert tracked more than 5,000 such campaigns, but only 3,400 are displayed as “legitimate”. On the other hand, CoinDesk has counted only 800 ICO projects over the past two years.
In September, Elementus published a study, according to which for all the time, projects through ICO raised $ 28.4 billion. However, recently the lack of regulatory clarity has noticeably cooled the ardor of market participants.
The main problem for any company is now the question of whether tokens are issued as securities. If the answer is yes, then the following question arises: has such a company registered its offer with the SEC or does its ICO fall under the exception?
As for the Commission itself, its position boils down to the fact that almost all ICOs qualify as offers of securities, and it does not matter how startups position them - be it the concept of SAFT, or any other mechanism.
Recall that by the end of this year, the European Organization of Securities and Markets (ESMA) intends to determine its position on the regulation of the ICO sphere.