What are the real reasons behind the 'virtual entity' nonsense when you could be selling the real shares in the real legal entity ?
The virtual entity is to ensure current American SEC regulations are not being broken by investors from America.
Why are you sure that calling it virtual will definitely exempt you from all SEC regulations?
This IP"V"O absolutely is under the purview of the SEC if this caters to US citizens. Any claim to the contrary is misinformed or a lie.
I'd be particularly interested to hear TAT's opinion on this, after his many condemnations of Burnside for doing something very similar.
Edit: added quote below from the BTC-TC thread:
Your perspective is short-sighted, in my opinion.
Yes, it is easier to think and behave how you recommend, but that does not make it healthy or right or smart or necessary.
This is not a question of shoddy legalese, it is calling a duck a spade for the preservation of the duck trade.
He can afford KYC hoops, and there are services that can help with that. Why assume he has made any effort at all in that regard?
No one expects a bitcoin financial service effort to be totally SEC-proof at this point, but the SEC does indeed value good faith efforts to operate within the law. They do not, however, respect deception and the contrary.
Yes, I can acknowledge that legal developments take time, I know this first hand. But I do not see how asserting a false position is wise, nor how a legal team could recommend such.
If you read the provided description of the term IPVO, it makes clear that this is not attempt to do what Burnside is doing. His use of "virtual" is in a context of a "game" in his text. This is not a game, it is virtual-currency-fueled finance. The difference here is that, from a legal standpoint, the IPVO, while similar in ways to an IPO, is quite
different.
To date, the bitcoin securities market has attempted to use the term IPO creatively by redefining it to suit its needs, but the term IPO, is meant to imply more than simply selling your company publicly. "IPO" is an accepted term that implies an offering that will be made public on traditional stock exchanges at Wall St and the like, which is obviously not the case here.
Being that most bitcoin IP(V)Os are things like fundraising, crowdfunding, profit-shares, informal entities, and partially unregulated, a unique term must be adopted to differentiate so as not to confuse those familiar with traditional IPOs.
As Danny mentions, there is trailblazing happening here. Both of our legal teams are hard at work establishing ourselves as best as possible within the current framework of guidance. As I have mentioned before, there will be more news on these developments soon, and there will be even more changes to come.