One of bitcoin’s leading luminaries, Vinny Lingham has an opinion on everything and an uncanny ability to sense market movements, earning him the moniker of Bitcoin Oracle. News.Bitcoin.com caught up with the serial entrepreneur to get his thoughts on bitcoin cash, Lightning Network, token models and more.
Also read: Five Reasons Why Bitcoin Cash is About to Win Big
Vinny Lingham on Regulation
On April 20, over 1,000 delegates gathered at the Fairmont in Santa Monica for Start Engine’s ICO Summit 2.0. The event began sharply at 8:30am, with Vinny Lingham the most recognizable figure on a panel titled The State of ICO Regulation. Afterwards, news.Bitcoin.com sat down with the Civic founder for a chat about dual token models, blockchain scaling, and the acrimony that’s riven elements of the bitcoin community.
The overarching message to emerge from the summit was that most tokens are securities, and following the regulatory route – likely Reg A+ – is the only way to avoid SEC censure. “If the price of something is determined by its ability to deliver an investment return then it’s a security,” acknowledges Vinny. Belatedly accepting that many, if not most, ICO tokens may fall into that category, a number of projects have opted for a dual token model, one a utility, the other a dividend. Vinny Lingham is not a fan of this setup however, opining:
People will raise money by whatever way they possibly can [even] if it means bending the rules, changing the system, and unsuspecting people will wind up putting up the money to buy it. But just because you can raise money in a certain way doesn’t mean you should.
Like most of the delegates at the Start Engine conference, he’s convinced that the
