Election uncertainty may put market certainty on the back burner

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Hold your horses.

While some folks around crypto think we could see the bullish rally take off after we get the election results, Empire’s Jason Yanowitz isn’t so sure. 

In Friday’s Roundup, he said that he doesn’t think we see the markets “rip” until potentially January or even February. 

“There could be more uncertainty” in November and December, he added, pointing out that he thinks the election results could be close.

“Both sides are already prepping for an all-out war to contest the election,” Yanowitz said. Last election, it took the Associated Press, for example, until Saturday, Nov. 7 to declare a winner. If there’s uncertainty, then it puts the market certainty on the back burner, he pointed out.

And now you know.

Immutable has received a Wells notice from the SEC, the latest in their de facto policy of regulation by enforcement. We received this within hours of our first ever conversation, on a timeline clearly accelerated to land before an election.

Sadly, stories like this are becoming…

— Immutable (@Immutable) October 31, 2024

Exchanges, NFTs, and now…gaming. 

Those are just some of the areas of crypto that’ve been targeted by the Securities and Exchange Commission. 

Immutable, last night, said it was “frustrated” to disclose the receipt of a Wells notice from the SEC. 

Now I know I’ve said this before, but a Wells notice doesn’t mean that a lawsuit is imminent, but it serves as a warning that an investigation has been conducted. 

Admittedly, the lawsuit odds for crypto companies are pretty high, but I will point out that we’re still waiting for the other shoe to drop against both Robinhood and Uniswap after their respective Wells notices arrived last spring.

Immutable believes that the notice is targeting both the listing and private sales of its token, IMX, back in 2021. However, the notice doesn’t specify what the SEC is looking at. 

“Prior to the issuance of a Wells notice, there are often multiple months of interviews and conversations between company counsel and the SEC, so the SEC can fully understand the situation. Instead, in our very first interaction with the SEC, we were told a Wells notice would be issued to the company within the week. We then received it within hours,” Immutable said. It further said that there were “fewer than 20 words of material explanation” about the investigation.

Whether or not the SEC is really pulling the punches right before the election is hard to assert, but one thing’s for certain: the SEC isn’t ready to turn down the heat on the crypto sector and we could continue to see more Wells notices and settlements into a potential bull market run.

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