Key Highlights
- SEC Crypto Task Force staff met with Steakhouse Financial and Latham & Watkins on September 4 to discuss crypto asset regulation.
- Steakhouse presented its DeFi vault products and curation activities involving permissionless, noncustodial lending protocols.
- The meeting addressed potential considerations under the Securities Act, Exchange Act, Advisers Act, and Investment Company Act.
Staff from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Crypto Task Force met with representatives of Steakhouse Financial Ltd and Latham & Watkins LLP on September 4, 2026. The discussion centered on approaches to addressing issues related to the regulation of crypto assets.
According to an SEC meeting memorandum, Steakhouse Financial Ltd and Latham & Watkins LLP representatives provided a document that was discussed during the meeting. The document is a letter dated August 5, 2026, from Stephen P. Wink of Latham & Watkins LLP requesting the meeting on behalf of Steakhouse Financial Ltd and its affiliates.
Meeting request and company background
The letter, submitted via electronic transmission to the Crypto Task Force at the SEC’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., states that Steakhouse is headquartered in Zug, Switzerland. It builds onchain vault products deployed on third-party permissionless, noncustodial DeFi lending protocols that operate on public blockchain networks.
The letter requests an opportunity to provide the Task Force with an overview of DeFi vaults, vault curation activities, and Steakhouse’s products related to those activities.
It also seeks discussion of related considerations under the federal securities laws, including the Securities Act, the Exchange Act, the Advisers Act, and the Investment Company Act. The letter notes that the discussion could be tailored to topics of greatest interest to the Crypto Task Force and its staff.
The letter lists the following proposed attendees: Mark Phillips, Co-Founder and Partner, Steakhouse Financial Ltd; Adrian Cachinero Vasiljevic, Co-Founder and Partner, Steakhouse Financial Ltd; Sebastien Derivaux, Co-Founder and Partner, Steakhouse Financial Ltd; Shaun Musuka, Chief Legal Officer, Steakhouse Financial Ltd; Stephen P. Wink, Partner, Latham & Watkins LLP; Zachary Fallon, Partner, Latham & Watkins LLP; and Daphne Lambadariou, Associate, Latham & Watkins LLP.
Context of recent task force meetings
The September 4 meeting follows a series of recent discussions held by the Crypto Task Force with other market participants. On September 1, 2026, Task Force staff met with representatives of digital asset infrastructure company Clique and C Guidry Law, PLLC.
That discussion covered how crypto platforms evaluate tokens before listing them, including the use of issuer disclosures and data recorded on public blockchains. Clique Founder and CEO Charles-Nicolas Gaubert-Amy participated, and the company provided a document titled “Token Listing Due Diligence and Onchain Evidence.”
On August 20, 2026, the Task Force met with representatives from Offchain Labs, Inc., and Arktouros PLLC. The discussion focused on approaches to addressing issues related to the regulation of crypto assets.
Offchain Labs, which originally developed the Arbitrum stack and continues to contribute to it, provided a letter requesting discussion of Layer 2 blockchain technologies and their intersection with federal securities laws. The Arbitrum stack is Layer 2 software designed to scale the Ethereum blockchain.
On August 12, 2026, staff met with representatives from WisdomTree, Inc. and Thorn Run Partners LLC. That meeting covered three areas: an update on WisdomTree and perspectives on the tokenized fund marketplace; discussion of wallet onboarding for tokenized fund products; and discussion of commission rulemaking and guidance for tokenized assets.
Document reviewed during the meeting
The August 5 letter from Latham & Watkins on behalf of Steakhouse forms the primary document discussed on September 4. It outlines the company’s request for a meeting to address DeFi vault products and related federal securities law considerations.
The letter expresses availability to meet at the Task Force’s convenience and thanks the Crypto Task Force for its consideration of the request.
The SEC meeting memorandum confirms that the document was provided by the Steakhouse Financial Ltd. and Latham & Watkins LLP representatives and was discussed during the September 4 session. No additional details regarding specific outcomes or conclusions from the meeting are included in the publicly available memorandum.
This sequence of meetings reflects ongoing engagement by the Crypto Task Force with various participants in the digital asset sector on regulatory topics under federal securities laws.
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