Friday, January 8, 2021 SEC Issues Statement on Custody of Digital Asset Securities by Special Purpose Broker-Dealers On December 23, 2020, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued a statement and request for comment relating to custody of digital asset securities by broker-dealers, including certain conditional, time-limited relief for such arrangements. The statement will become effective 60 days after its publication in the Federal Register. Most significantly, the SEC’s statement indicates that, for a five-year period, a broker-dealer will not be subject to an SEC enforcement action on the basis that the broker-dealer has deemed itself to have obtained and maintained physical possession or control of customer fully paid and excess margin digital asset securities for the purposes of paragraph (b)(1) of SEC Rule 15c3-3 (the Customer Protection Rule), which requires such possession or control,