Leadership and Companies
SEC Opens Tokenized Stock Trading Under Temporary Five-Year Exemption
The SEC granted conditional relief for approved venues to trade certain tokenized stocks through permissioned liquidity pools.
What happened
On September 17, 2026, the Securities and Exchange Commission granted temporary, conditional relief to Tokenized Securities Venues from the Exchange Act’s definition of an exchange. The venues can trade tokenized National Market System stocks through permissioned automated market makers and liquidity pools. Conditions include limits on listed symbols and trading volume, equivalent shareholder rights, issuer notification for third-party tokenization, public and auditable smart contracts, and simultaneous halts with the underlying stock. Venues must also disclose their operations and trading activity. Liquidity providers receive a temporary conditional exemption from the dealer definition. The relief expires five years after publication, while the SEC seeks public comment.
Why it matters
The order creates a regulated route for secondary trading of certain tokenized stocks and allows qualifying liquidity providers to operate without automatically being treated as dealers. Participation remains limited by the exemption’s conditions and trading caps.
Source: U.S. SEC Press Releases