Andre Cronje, an eminent figure of the DEFI space, awarded his departure from the sector in 2022 to the legal challenges involving the Commission for American Securities and the Exchange (SEC).
In a blog article on January 28, Cronje explained how its legal obstacles with the financial regulator began in 2021 after launching Keep3R, a DEFI protocol designed to correspond to organizations and other job suppliers with technical professionals.
Dry surveys
According to Cronje, the SEC initially asked for information on the finance of our needs, a project it launched in 2020. At the time, finance these days was an eminent DEFI loan aggregator who had attracted more than 6 billions of dollars in deposits at its peak in 2021.
Cronje said that the SEC survey focused on potential links with fundraising and investor activities. However, he noted that the protocol had “collected any money, sold no token (and) did nothing that could be considered a violation of the laws on the titles of countries”.
He added:
“I did not win any fees of the protocol, I had neither founder, team nor any allowance, there was no financial advantage of the protocol for myself.”
However, Cronje spent weeks compiling the information requested by the dry, often conducting research to find the necessary details.
According to him, he initially assumed that the supply of the requested data would conclude the question. However, an additional correspondence of the regulator reported a change of tone, which encouraged Cronje to request legal aid – a challenge given its lack of resources and legal links.
He continued:
“While the letters continued to flow, it changed” the study of “the increase, and when it became obvious that it was not an angle of attack, it moved to concentration On the vaults of our shades as “investment vehicles”, since the chests, “works”, then the depositors benefit from “the work of others”. »»
Cronje, a non -American citizen with limited links with the country’s markets, expressed his confusion as to the scope of the investigation.
According to him, the requests for information in the SEC have consumed a lot of time and resources, which hinders its ability to focus on innovation. These requests have intensified over two years, which led him to leave the DEFI space entirely to avoid other complications.
He wrote:
“After 2 years to face this every month, and sleepless nights and sleepless stress. I chose (to get away). I am sure that many would say that I shouldn’t have completed, but I also believe that anyone said that it was never in a position like this. You receive all the drawbacks, but none of the advantages. »»
Why Cronje tells his story
Cronje explained that, following the advice of regulatory advisers, he refrained from publicly discussing the situation during the investigation to avoid aggravating his legal position.
Now he feels more comfortable sharing his story, quoting what he considers a change in the approach to apply the dry under his current direction.
The revelation of Cronje is not surprising, since the former president of the dry, Gary Gensler, is a renowned crypto skeptic who led important legal challenges against cryptographic companies. However, the current chief of the financial regulation agency Mark Uyeda has shown more opening to the sector.
Cronje has since returned to the Crypto space as co-founder of Sonic Labs, the team behind Sonic, a high performance blockchain solution.
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