Coinbase lists securities: The most popular cryptocurrency exchange platform in the United States, Coinbase Inc., just received the green light from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to list digital tokens that have been deemed as securities.

Coinbase was given the approval by the SEC and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to purchase Digital Wealth LLC and Keystone Capital Corp, a spokesperson from Coinbase told Bloomberg yesterday.

Coinbase Lists Securities: The Ball is Rolling Now

These new acquisitions allow Coinbase to offer so-called security tokens. Coinbase will also now be able to place Digital Wealth and Keystone Capital under federal oversight.

In the past, Coinbase has been regulated by a patchwork of state authorities. Coinbase can now operate as a broker-dealer, as well as a registered investment adviser and an alternative trading system that operates outside of the ‘traditional’ public stock exchanges.

Coinbase execs believe these regulated trading platforms could eventually handle billions of dollars of tokens sold by companies in ICOs. Despite a global crackdown effort, ICOs have raised more than $12 billion already in 2018, according to CoinSchedule.

The SEC has already deemed that most of the coins raised in ICOs are securities, which means they must comply and register with the federally mandated laws.

Security Standoff

However, Coinbase isn’t the only contender to become the first platform allowed to trade security tokens. Circle Internet Financial Ltd told Bloomberg last month that it was seeking to get a federal banking license to provide more services to its customers, including offering its investors security tokens. Circle Internet Financial is partially backed by Goldman Sachs, which gives them a bit of a competitive advantage but Coinbase currently has over 13 million active members on its platform—so what will have the bigger impact?

Circle states, however, that it will pursue its SEC regulations before it seeks the banking license. It seems Coinbase has jumped the gun and already has approval from all the necessary places to get the ball rolling on the securities token platform.

It remains unknown when this venture will be released to the public, but with Coinbase’s government compliance, it shouldn’t take long at all.