When is an Asset “Digital”?
As outlined in an earlier article, blockchain-native digital bearer instruments such as Bitcoin’s mining reward bitcoin introduced new concepts of ownership and value transfer, upsetting the order of enumerated asset classes heretofore seemingly complete.
A fact that thus far has escaped many legal professionals, regulators and cryptocurrency enthusiasts, all of which seem to be content to force round blockchain pegs through narrow square holes of legacy regulations and/or vernacular designed for financial products lacking the sophistication of blockchain-based solutions.
In the absence of truly interdisciplinary discourse, amateur legal practitioners and technologists started to apply broad labels to a number of concepts which are still undergoing transformations.
My latest Hackernoon article discusses the nuances of the frequently applied – and more often abused – term digital asset.
