Yuga Labs Cleared After Long-Running SEC Investigation, No Enforcement Action Taken

Yuga Labs, the company behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFT collection has been investigated and closed by the US SEC.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has closed its investigation into Yuga Labs, the company behind the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFT collection, without taking any enforcement action.

The regulator confirmed the news in a statement on Friday, concluding the probe that started in October 2022.

The SEC’s inquiry, which was announced in October, aimed to determine if any of Yuga Labs’ or ApeCoin (APE)’s NFT collections should be classified as securities. The probe was also part of a broader effort by former SEC Chair Gary Gensler to target NFT marketplaces and fractionalized NFTs.

The closure of the investigation comes in the wider context of a broader crypto regulation U-turn the SEC has done under the Trump administration. In the past weeks, the agency has dropped its cases against crypto firms like OpenSea, Robinhood, Gemini, and Uniswap Labs.

The SEC has also settled legal disputes with Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) (CRYPTO: CBI) and Kraken, two of the largest U.S. cryptocurrency exchanges. It comes after the Trump administration’s move to loosen regulatory pressure on the digital asset industry.

On Friday, the SEC’s Crypto Task Force announced plans to hold public roundtables as part of an initiative focused on providing clearer cryptocurrency regulations. The first session, scheduled for March 21, will be dedicated to discussing the classification of digital assets under U.S. law.

According to OpenSea data, the Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) NFT collection saw a slight price increase following the news, rising to 13.75 ETH (approximately $29,650). However, it’s important to note that BAYC NFTs remain more than 90% below their May 2022 peak of 153.7 ETH.

Furthermore, other Yuga Labs collections, such as CryptoPunks and Mutant Ape Yacht Club, have also experienced significant price declines. In a related development, NFTs linked to the token known as ApeCoin (APE) have seen a decrease of over 95% from this year’s high, which aligns with a broader downturn in the cryptocurrency market.