@configsecret

The Dallas Morning News – Opinion: Ethereum, and blockchain technologies, are threatened by Washington regulators By Joseph Lubin of Consensys https://lnkd.in/gPU4fQ7w Texas can help keep the next phase of the internet’s development on track The Texas “economic miracle” is a well-established fact and the latest data from the Texas Work Commission backs it up: In this year’s first quarter, the state enjoyed the largest increase in nonagricultural employment across the country, posted record-high levels of jobs and logged its 36th consecutive month of positive annual growth. Texas has built on this momentum and emerged as a decisive leader for so-called Web3 innovation. In other words, that’s the decentralization of blockchain technologies and token-based economics. Blockchain is the mechanism that records digital transactions across computers. This is no accident: Texas legislators have intentionally crafted pro-crypto policies which have, in turn, attracted a robust ecosystem of developers and miners. And the state’s deregulated power market allows for access to inexpensive power complemented by a healthy mix from renewables. These are just some of the reasons we relocated our company, Consensys, from New York to North Texas last year. We were confident that Texas would be the optimal home for our core offerings, built on Ethereum — the world’s second-largest blockchain — and powered by ether, the digital commodity that underpins it. More precisely, we concluded that Texas’ unique alchemy of business-savvy leaders, encouragement of innovation and stable regulatory environment would allow Consensys to help shepherd the next phase of the internet’s development. The hallmarks of this next phase — transparency, security, and accessibility, all controlled by the user, not any big tech company — are undeniably ground-breaking. That’s why companies around the world are already building software applications to run on Ethereum. And why the biggest asset managers in the world are working on asset tokenization using Ethereum. Yet all this potential is under imminent attack from unelected regulators in Washington. Without legal authority, the Securities and Exchange Commission is in the process of arbitrarily reclassifying ether from a commodity to a security so that it can enforce the sort of registration and other requirements that attach to securities (such as bonds, stocks and other investments) under its jurisdiction. 1/3