So, Coinbase wanted to convince the SEC they are not a securotoes exchange. The SEC didn't buy it. Instead of going forward and properly register, Coinbase choose to continue operating under their own interpretation of the law. Now the SEC sued, tool them long enough, and we will find out who of those two is right.

If I had any money with Coinbase or Binance, I pull it out ASAP.

Coinbase hired a top legal team to avoid regulation. You're parroting the story that those expensive lawyers have concocted as justification for their efforts to avoid enforcement while the company was busy selling unregistered securities.

Or Coinbase hired the best legal team in the world to seed confusion because they never wanted or intended to register, but needed a hypothetical position to defend against journalists and skeptics.

Obviously a wild conspiracy claim. But then again we're talking about fintech.

They have hired the top legal team in the world with the specific remit of "get us the answers that are easiest and cheapest for Coinbase".

That is entirely tangential, if not orthogonal to the subject of "define securities".

I mean from Coinbase's own filing. "The SEC has stated that digital tokens are securities. We disagree..."

and "registration under the current rules is, for many market participants, either not possible or not economically viable given the associated and unnecessary compliance burdens"

It's not that Coinbase disagrees that they're securities, as such. It's that they say it's too much work or cost to do so.