Updated: April 10, 2024, 3:05 PM EDT
Uniswap UNI
-15.80%
Labs was warned that federal regulators would file a lawsuit against Labs, the founder of the protocol. said Wednesday
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sent a Wealth Notice on Wednesday to Uniswap Labs, the organization that developed the decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol of the same name. A Wells Notice is a formal notice that the SEC intends to prosecute a defendant. The move comes amid a broader regulatory crackdown on DeFi, which is seen as an intractable part of the industry that the SEC chairman once called the “Wild West.”
“Rather than creating clear and informed rules, the SEC is more focused on attacking long-standing good actors like Uniswap and Coinbase,” Uniswap founder Hayden Adams wrote in a post to X on Wednesday. “It has been clear for some time that we have decided to focus.”
“I’m not surprised,” he added. “I’m just annoyed, disappointed and ready to fight,” he added.
According to data from CoinGecko, Uniswap is the largest decentralized exchange (DEX) by daily trading volume, handling 22.5% of trading volume. The targeting by regulators comes about a year after rival SushiSwap was subpoenaed.
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About the author
Elizabeth Napolitano is a data reporter covering business and technology news with a focus on cryptocurrency. Before she joined The Block, Elizabeth reported on BigTech, AI, crypto, and video games for CBS Moneywatch. As a CoinDesk reporter, she covered DeFi, NFTs, and US courts. She received a master’s degree in journalism from CUNY. X: Follow her at @LizKNapolitano.