[rlucas]

Important glaring factual error here.

Under securities law, ALMOST ANY kind of deal to trade money for an intangible where the buyer expects to profit from others’ work is a security. Exchange listings having nothing to do with it.

Nothing is new under the sun and since the Securities Act of 1933 innumerable schemes to sell paper to rubes have been tried using different names, labels, or tweaks to avoid the regs. Universally the shenanigans get slapped.

Pretty much, the thing that ICO promoters want to do (get money or pseudo-money from people looking to profit) is tautologically securities sales under our current US regulatory regime.

Source: business partner and I burned a lot of lawyers’ time in late 2012 seeing what was going to come of the equity crowdfunding/JOBS Act stuff for a startup, and ultimately decided to wave off (you’ll note that essentially nothing new has come from that; most all the issuers in that space still rely upon traditional SEC exemptions etc.)