The regulator said that based on the results of the Howey test, it is possible to draw conclusions about the intention of investors to receive financial profit related to the performance of the company that issues and manages DASH. Thus, this type of digital asset is an unregistered security and is subject to regulation by the SEC. Namely, the asset must be registered under the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934.

The DASH community has come out in defense of the crypto asset, stating that the Commission does not have sufficient arguments to justify such a classification. First of all, DASH is a Proof-of-Work consensus cryptocurrency and cannot be considered a security. In addition, the DASH ecosystem is a decentralized payment system that is not controlled by any organization, but is managed through a distributed ledger between network nodes.

From the point of view of the opponents of the SEC, the classification of DASH according to the results of the Howie test also does not hold water. Since the community is not focused on the expectation of profit from any particular management company. DASH is a payment technology where miners are paid for providing computing power, masternodes are rewarded for running a node, but no one is paid or rewarded for owning the coin.

Earlier, the former chairman of the CFTC, Timothy Massad, proposed the creation of a self-regulatory organization (SRO) under the auspices of the SEC and the CFTC, responsible for developing regulatory rules for regulating the cryptocurrency industry and standardizing methods for classifying digital assets.