Reports have it that Wyoming one of the states in the United States has recently passed two new bills in a bid to encourage a suitable regulatory environment that is conducive/crucial to digital currency and Blockchain innovation. This news of new legislation relating to the Blockchain in the US state of Wyoming was reported by Wyoming Blockchain Coalition’s president, Caitlin Long. It was done via social media platform Twitter, between January 10 and 11.
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As of press time, it was the status of one of the proposed bills namely House Bill 62 has been updated on the state of Wyoming’s legislature page, showing that the new legislation passed 8-1 and has already been placed on a general file for some time. As for the official status of House Bill 57 the second bill, no update has been given at press time. It was last updated on January 8 after which Long tweeted today, that Bill 57 was passed with no rifts.
Affected Tokens Will Not Need An Exemption From Federal Securities Laws
Bill 62 is known as the “Wyoming Utility Token Act-property amendments.” It is significant to the establishment of a new asset class, setting “open Blockchain tokens with unique consumptive characteristics like an intangible personal property.” This definition of House Bill 62 clearly means that the said tokens don’t need to be exempted from federal securities laws. Based on the report, the Wyoming Utility Token Act-property amendments bill clarifies that:
“The open Blockchain tokens governed under this act don’t constitute securities because an individual who has sold a consumptive open Blockchain token can’t receive any cash payments or share of profits from a business or developer, but will receive a fixed sum of consumable services, property or content.”
Bill 57: Designed to Facilitate An Encouraging Business Environment for Developers
The second legislation is Bill 57 entitled “Financial technology sandbox.” This bill is related to the formation of a fintech regulatory “sandbox” (a supervised, flexible testing environment that offers waivers for some statutes and rules that would’ve otherwise hampered innovation. The establishment of this bill reportedly aims to facilitate an encouraging business atmosphere for the developers of financial products and services, ultimately attracting fintech talent to Wyoming.
As per a previous report from 2018, the Wyoming national assembly passed a legislation known as House Bill 70. This bill helps relax securities regulations and the transmission of money laws for certain tokens provided via ICOs in the state.
Another house bill relating to the exemption of crypto from the Money Transmitter Act in the state was passed by the legislature in March 2018. Additionally, a house bill that exempts digital assets from state property taxation was passed by the Wyoming state legislature in February 2018. More pro-crypto and Blockchain related bills have been passed into the law of the state of Wyoming.
Definition of Utility Tokens is Significant in Bringing Them Under State Legislative Purview
We can recall from an earlier report that Caitlin Long remarked the unfolding regulation of virtual currencies in the United States at federal and state levels. According to her the definition of what utility tokens should be as a new asset class should be seen as significant to ushering them under the jurisdiction of state legislators, instead of national agencies like the SEC, CFTC and FinCEN.
Brian Lubin is a Crypto News Reporter for Smartereum. He's well-known for his reports on the crypto markets.
