The SEC essentially wants the public to understand the current legal actions as a part of a battle against fraud. The lawsuits are in fact a paternalistic attempt by the SEC to prevent people from making investments that they believe to be unwise. It is clear that this confusion is incredibly unjust to both the companies being targeted, Coinbase in particular, and the American public at large, who trusts the SEC’s competence.

In its allegations against Coinbase, the SEC’s key allegation is that the exchange “has made calculated business decisions to make crypto assets available for trading in order to increase its own revenues, which are primarily based on trading fees from customers.”

Whether Coinbase could have complied with the rules in the manner that the SEC believes it should have is a contentious topic for discussion. However, the core of the SEC’s complaint is that Coinbase violated the law by developing a service that users—including myself—actually used before trying to improve it.

However, the painfully revealed Coinbase charges are meant to protect investors against some terrible, deceptive predator. In a statement that the SEC has emphasized on social media, SEC director of enforcement Gurbir S. Grewal claims that “Coinbase’s calculated decisions allowed it to earn billions… at the expense of investors by denying them the protections to which they were entitled.”

Contrarily, Binance is charged with a few offenses that appear to be true transgressions, most notably pricing manipulation that caused harm to customers. Other allegations, however, deny Binance’s authority to offer services that its clients blatantly want.