The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has ordered the Salt Lending cryptographic project to offer a refund to investors who participated in its initial coin offering in 2017.
Salt Blockchain Inc. owns a funding platform that allows it to receive dollar-denominated loans secured in cryptographic currency. Within two weeks, it must post a press release on its website notifying investors of the refund due.
According to the SEC's own statement, ICO Salt was conducted in violation of legal requirements in the field of securities, as its organizer has not been officially registered with the agency. The regulator decided that SALT tokens were securities, as the issuer attracted investors with promises of profits from investing in them.
Investors will be given three months to send Salt applications. The project must pay them full compensation with interest. Salt also agreed to pay $250,000 fine within 10 days. In addition, they will have to register the SALT token as a security.
The SEC investigation of Salt The Wall Street Journal was reported back in November 2018. According to information published then, the project received a regulatory summons concerning its ICO in February of the same year.
"Salt has been working with the SEC for several months and has been moving towards today's agreement," the company said on its blog today. - During this time, Salt continued to grow and proved the viability of its leasing business. Salt now intends to continue expanding its product line to include asset management and capital preservation-oriented products.
SALT tokens were initially sold at $10 per unit, but are now at around $0.05.