Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev defended his company’s tokenized stock products on CNBC, offering his first televised comments since AMC Entertainment chief Adam Aron went public with his objections.
Aron has accused Robinhood of issuing unregistered tokens tied to AMC stock in violation of U.S. securities law, and threatened to bring in outside counsel and the SEC.
A Public Feud Over Stock Tokens
The dispute began after Robinhood extended its tokenized stock offering to cover AMC and more than 190 other companies through Robinhood Assets Limited, without those firms directly signing on.
Aron reacted furiously on X, arguing the products let Robinhood create exposure to AMC stock without the company’s involvement, undermining the usual relationship between a company and its shareholders.
“I find this practice to be contemptible, outrageous, disgusting, detestable, inexcusable, vile. How can it possibly be legal? We have no connection to this at all, and do not condone it in any way.”
— Aron
AMC’s stock jumped as much as 15% in premarket trading when the public row first broke out, with traders piling into both the shares and related tokens.
Tenev Says Issuers Cannot Control Everything
On Wednesday, Tenev told CNBC that a public company cannot dictate every financial product built once its shares start trading.
He described Robinhood’s tokens as debt securities backed one to one by the underlying shares held as collateral. Token holders get economic exposure to the stock but no voting rights in the company itself.
Robinhood’s chief legal officer, former SEC commissioner Dan Gallagher, also pushed back publicly, defending the company’s reading of U.S. securities law.
The clash raises a genuinely open question for regulators, namely whether a brokerage can wrap any public company’s stock into a tradable token without that company’s consent. AMC’s threatened SEC complaint could be the first real test of where that line sits.
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