Yesterday,Coinbase CEO says CB had 30 different meetings with regulators where they were heavily questioned. They then repeatedly requested clearer regulators but were basically ignored. They also have a dormant securities broker-dealer license because "t

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong recently did an interview with the WSJ that was pretty illuminating. Firstly, Armstrong says when they first intended to be a public company they had to outline all their business plans where were approved that would have included their plans for offering staking as a service, which the SEC now alleges are securities. There is always the risk of regulators changing their mind but it is an interesting point.

On another point, he outlined that they had had over 30 meetings with regulators and the SEC where they were heavily questioned about "everything under the sun". From this you would expect that the SEC would be very aware of their business actions at the time as well as future plans. From this Brain states they gained very little feedback from the SEC even after essentially begging for regulatory clarity they were met with radio silence. That is of course until now and until recently.

It is also interesting that Armstrong also says Coinbase holds a broker-dealer license. For those unaware, this license is necessary for an company who wishes to buy/sell securities for themselves or/and others. This is to say that Coinbase did go through the necessary regulatory steps to deal in securities but in their words "there is no way to activate it" with the SEC regulators. Coinbase have made these allegations before that there is literally no way to come under (SEC-specified) securities regulations, despite what Gensler claims.