The United States’ securities market watchdog the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has recently announced that it is looking for blockchain data sources to conduct market research on the decade-old industry.

According to the announcement, the SEC is trying “to determine the availability and technical capability of large and small businesses to provide blockchain data to support the SEC’s efforts to monitor risk, improve compliance, and inform commission policy with respect to digital assets.”

Asia Trading Summit – The Leading Investment Event in China

In addition, the agency is also seeking data on popular blockchains to study and monitor the transaction details.

This came only a month after the SEC announced that cryptocurrency is one of its top priorities for research in 2019.

The announcement explained that the watchdog agency is looking to get detailed data on the sector including the processes used to extract them. It also sees verification steps to ensure any data losses which often happens due to the data transformation tools and the applied processes. The agency also emphasized the accuracy of the data and asked the interested companies to parse the data as one of its requirements.

Moreover, the agency wants the ability to identify the owners of wallet addresses for multiple cryptocurrencies to bring transparency in the market.

The Big Debate

The SEC is trying to get a hold on the cryptocurrency market in the US especially on the projects opting to raise funds via initial coin offerings (ICOs). However, a big debate is going on the proper classification of the tokens issued by the blockchain firms – whether they fall under securities or not.

Last month, Finance Magnates reported that the agency’s hostility had forced the blockchain firms to take advantage of a loophole and promote their products only to accredited investors in the country instead of the general public. As many as 300 ICOs were approved by the SEC in 2018 opting to raise funds through this loophole.