Just being pedantic, they have monetary value, can be traded, and aren't physical objects, so they are securities.

Fiat currency is a security too, without legal tender laws it can't function as money, and its dynamics are a ponzi, the cantillion effect is a type of ponzi where the poor people pay the bill for the ones at the spigot... Bitcoin satisfies the Howie test less than FRNs.

I've been watching a specific DAO on Ethereum whose creator officially claims their "governance tokens" are not investments.

That same creator has sold some of his own (held in a second unnamed wallet) for a few mil and the DAO itself regularly pays out tokens straight from the official multisig (which happens to hold over 70% of the entire supply) to random burner wallets who instantly cash out to exchanges.

Oh and they also use their shitcoin tokens to compensate devs on top of their salary.

Don't worry tho guys they aren't secuities they're """governance tokens."""

Fuck it I'll tell you the project I'm talking about it's ENS. So many skeletons in their closet I've been digging up from blockchain analysis and discussing with insiders.

Absolutely