Will the SEC help Canaan Creative?

According to the self-media IPO Early News, Canaan Creative, the world's second largest Bitcoin mining machine manufacturer, has reportedly secretly submitted an application for listing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to raise $200 million. It has become the first "mining machine giant" among the three major domestic mining machine manufacturers (the other two are Bitmain and Ebang International) to officially go public in the United States.

According to Tencent News’ “First Line” report, Canaan Creative plans to choose the New York Stock Exchange as its listing location. A source told “First Line” that based on Canaan Creative’s previous communication with the SEC, there will be “no major problems” in passing the review this time.

Sad memories

From A-shares, the New Third Board to the Hong Kong stock market, and now planning to list on the US stock market, Canaan Creative has fought again and again despite repeated failures.
Canaan Creative's journey to go public began in 2016. Three years later, disappointments did not stop this mining machine giant from going public. From domestic to foreign countries, they want to seize every possible opportunity. Policy uncertainty, instability of the cryptocurrency market and other factors have become stumbling blocks for mining machine companies on their road to going public.

In June last year, Canaan Creative was the first to launch an IPO in Hong Kong, followed by the other two giants. Six months later, the application expired.
In July this year, Canaan Creative was the first to be rumored to be going public in the U.S., and the other two giants are also said to be in the process of going public in the U.S. If the rumors are true, what will be the outcome this time?

The SEC’s attitude is changing

It is not surprising to go public in the United States. As we all know, the U.S. regulatory authorities have been active recently, especially the SEC's first approval of a blockchain project to raise funds through the issuance of tokens in July, which is of great significance.

On July 11, the SEC approved blockchain startup Blockstack to provide digital token sales services worth $28 million under the Reg A+ exemption. The next day, the SEC approved streaming platform YouNow to conduct a compliant token issuance plan under the Reg A+ exemption.

The SEC stated that most blockchain tokens except Bitcoin and Ethereum are securities. According to the Securities Act of 1933, the issuance of securities must be registered with the SEC unless exempted under Regulations D, S, A (i.e. "Reg D", "Reg S", "Reg A"). Reg A + allows issuers to raise funds from ordinary investors, which is conducive to increasing the liquidity of the securities issued by the issuer.

Blockstack and YouNow became the first to try this, although it cost a lot of manpower, material resources and financial resources. According to TechCrunch, Props had been working with the SEC for two years before it was approved. The head of the Blockstack project also said that they talked with the SEC for nearly 10 months and spent more than two million US dollars.

This move by the SEC is undoubtedly groundbreaking, and it has given many blockchain project owners a viable regulatory path. Canaan Creative reportedly submitted an application to the SEC for listing at this point in time, perhaps because it saw the opportunity of the SEC's change in attitude. If token financing is acceptable, will normal IPOs be more relaxed?

Busy SEC

The SEC has been in the news a lot lately.

Recently, the SEC’s Department of Finance issued a no-action letter to blockchain gaming company Pocketful of Quarters (PoQ), allowing the company to issue game tokens on the Ethereum blockchain and sell the tokens.

According to Cryptopolitan, Robert Cohen, the head of the Cyber ​​Division of the SEC, recently announced his resignation. Cohen previously led the earlier ICO accountability of Kik. Cohen's resignation is considered to be a change in the SEC's position on ICOs. However, before leaving, he must deal with issues such as Kik's ICO.

According to Trustnodes, the US SEC plans to operate a Bitcoin node and an Ethereum node through a contractor. The SEC did not give any specific reasons for why it needs to run its own nodes, only saying that it will support its risk monitoring, improve compliance, and inform the committee's policies on digital assets.

Judging from the SEC's actions, its attention to the cryptocurrency circle is increasing day by day. The impact of the SEC's attitude on the crypto circle is self-evident. The approval of token financing alone has attracted countless blockchain projects. For the mining machine giant that has been seeking to go public, this is a positive signal, but we will have to wait and see what the result will be.