Ethereum’s Classification as a Commodity: Insights from Consensys Creator Joseph Lubin

According to Joseph Lubin’s statement during an interview with CNBC, he believes Ethereum (ETH) should be categorized as a commodity.

Lubin used previous statements from regulatory agencies like the CFTC and SEC to support what he said. Regardless of that fact, Gary Gensler has not considered Ether to be a commodity so far, unlike his decision on Bitcoin.

The founder of Consensys says it's clear Ether is a commodity, not a security amid regulatory crackdown on crypto, as he unveils the first ever survey on perception over crypto and Web3.@ethereumjoseph @tanvirgill2 @willkoulouris #BTC #ETH #TRON #Web3 @Consensys pic.twitter.com/IBIsvdQRlW

— CNBC's Street Signs (@StreetSignsCNBC) June 28, 2023

Lubin mentioned during the interview that Bill Hinman’s lecture in 2018 effectively declared Ether to be outside the definition of security.

The individual who co-founded Ethereum highlighted the fact that 18 coworkers of Hinman played a part in the speech, indicating consensus within the SEC at that particular moment. He didn’t perceive it as a major issue.

However, he did recognize that some regulators would still resist accepting the fact that Ether is not considered a security. Lubin highlighted the developments in the Bitcoin market during the previous year.

He emphasized the importance of the initiative to “clean up the CeFi rot” and cited successful advancements and launches in 2022 as evidence. CeFi, or centralized finance, has not followed the decentralized concept of cryptocurrencies and has been criticized for that.

Despite Lubin’s claims’ strength, they have no bearing on the official classifications of ether. Gensler and the SEC have not given Ether their official certification, declaring it a commodity.

DApps on the Ethereum network experienced a decline

Despite a 60% reduction in gas costs, DApp usage on the Ethereum network stalled out. Notably, on June 26, the seven-day average transaction cost fell to $3.7 from $9 four weeks earlier. DApp active addresses decreased by 27% over the same time period as well.

Uniswap and MetaMask Swap caused much of the loss, while many nonfungible tokens (NFT) marketplaces saw more people using their wallets.

Despite Uniswap NFT Aggregator’s underwhelming result, OpenSea, Blur, Manifold, LooksRare, and Unick saw a respectable increase in user traffic.

The drop in the total value locked (TVL) to its lowest point since August 2020 poses a severe problem for Ethereum smart contracts. From April 28 to June 28, the DefiLlama indicator decreased from 13.9 million ETH to another 13.9 million ETH.