Howey ARRR Sailing Forward.
By: Mike O
Tags: Cypherpunk, Zksnark, Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, Privacy

Securities, currencies, Howey compliant projects, de-listings, and the SEC have all been hot topics since mid-2017 when governments had finally set their sights on regulating the cryptocurrency market. Since then possible regulation has changed how exchanges & projects have worked together and have become a very important aspect to consider when working on a new project. Fortunately, the contributors(team) to Piratechain had considered these new crypto-currency rites of passage and have already progressed in ‘maturity’ milestones to meet some regulatory standards. As of now, we have the 1st of 3 possible “Coin Opinion Letters” needed to list on exchanges and give confidence to holders of $ARRR that the project is well in line with current standards.

There are several coin opinion letters to be obtained but the Big three are for the United States, Hong-Kong/China, and The United Kingdom. The US letter is by far the most important and versatile one to have, it is the letter they ask for in other countries as the US is perceived to be the country “leading” regulation at the moment. An example of the respected use globally is that securities laws in New Zealand are similar so the US letter is accepted there currently.

We have now acquired our USA letter. It is essentially a formal written statement made by a crypto knowledgeable lawyer team who audited several aspects of the project, including its creation, technical specifications, team, “use-cases” and whether or not there are any promises of financial gain aside from a store of value. This letter accomplishes a few things for us as a project. Firstly, it is a demand of a few exchanges to be listed as these exchanges NEED to stay within any regulations that exist or ones that could pop up in the future, so while the laws are yet to be fully decided these are standards projects need to keep if they have a long term vision. Secondly, aside from listing, this also prevents the possibility of an abrupt DE-listing from exchanges due to fear of regulation issues with projects that are yet to be fully clarified if it is a security or utility/currency, which has become more and more common over the last year or so. Third, this letter is a strong sign of maturity and foresight for a project. It brings confidence to holders and potential new community members, showing that we are here to handle each professional aspect that is needed to carry the project on into the future as far as we can and that we are willing to play by the rules globally when needed. This attitude and attention to detail is also something much larger exchanges need to see before they will consider taking an application.

For all the same reasons, we will be looking to obtain an opinion letter for Chinese markets, although at the moment they seem more open to listing projects that do not have that country-specific letter, as I said above, it is a necessary item to meet possible future standards or issues head-on.

This is an exciting milestone for the project and I look forward to the new opportunities that this gives the project to grow!