The US Securities and Exchange Commission has filed to drop another of its crypto lawsuits, this time its unregistered securities sales case against crypto influencer and YouTuber Ian Balina.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The SEC said in a May 1 joint stipulation with Balina to an Austin federal court that it \u201cbelieves the dismissal of this case is appropriate,\u201d citing the work of the agency\u2019s Crypto Task Force.<\/p>\n
The agency didn\u2019t give a reason for wanting to dismiss its case, but said its decision \u201cdoes not necessarily reflect the Commission\u2019s position on any other case.\u201d<\/p>\n
Balina told Cointelegraph in March that the SEC had informed him<\/a> it would recommend the court dismiss the case and claimed the agency\u2019s actions were based on a shift in the agency\u2019s priorities.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously, the new administration is pro-crypto,\u201d Balina said. The SEC has seen a change in leadership under US President Donald Trump, who appointed former crypto lobbyist Paul Atkins to chair the agency.<\/p>\n The joint stipulation argued a dismissal would also conserve the court\u2019s resources \u201cwithout costs or fees to either party.\u201d<\/p>\n Balina is the CEO of Token Metrics, a crypto influencer with 140,000 followers on X, and a YouTuber whom the SEC accused of improperly promoting crypto projects, particularly during the initial coin offering (ICO<\/a>) boom circa 2017.<\/p>\n The SEC sued Balina in 2022, alleging that he conducted an unregistered securities offering of Sparkster (SPRK) tokens when he formed an investing pool on Telegram in 2018.<\/p>\n The SEC claimed that US-based investors<\/a> participated in Balina\u2019s investing pool, using Ether (ETH<\/a>), which was validated by a network of nodes \u201cwhich are clustered more densely in the United States than in any other country.\u201d<\/p>\n Related: <\/strong><\/em>SEC drops investigation into PayPal\u2019s stablecoin<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n The court sided with the SEC and, in May 2024, ruled that SPRK was an investment contract<\/a> under US securities laws, where investors pooled money into a common enterprise expecting profits due to the efforts of others.<\/p>\n Excerpt of the joint stipulation. Source: PACER<\/em><\/p>\n The move is the latest in a long list of crypto-related court actions that the SEC has quashed under the Trump administration\u2019s favorable stance toward the industry.\u00a0<\/p>\n Over the past month, it has dropped several cases and abandoned multiple investigations against crypto firms, including against Coinbase, Ripple, Kraken, Opensea and PayPal\u2019s stablecoin<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\nShift in crypto policy<\/h2>\n