BarnBridge DAO, which uses a small DeFi protocol, opened a voting process on how it should respond to a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation.
To vote opened Tuesday on whether BarnBridge co-founders Tyler Ward and Troy Murray should have the “authority to take any action necessary to comply with the Order of the Securities and Exchange Commission against BarnBridge.”
The move came after BarnBridge attorney Douglas Park told DAO members via Discord in July that the SEC was to research. Park said at the time that all work on BarnBridge-related products should stop and that people should not be compensated for the work they do for the DAO until further notice.
BarnBridge is now asking whether it must pay for disgorgement, as required by the SEC’s order, and whether it must “sell any tokens it may sell and allow Ward and Murray to distribute the tokens.”
Voting is due on October 12. The SEC declined to comment.
The SEC’s crackdown on DAOs
The US regulator has previously taken legal action against decentralized autonomous organizations, or DAOs.
The agency said earlier this year that the American CryptoFed failed to meet the requirementinformation about its business operations and financial condition. It also contained materially misleading statements and omissions, including inconsistencies about whether the tokens are securities, the SEC said.

