Telegram Founder Durov Should Testify in SEC Case Over Gram Token: Judge

Telegram's founder and CEO Pavel Durov, as well as two other employees, should give testimony in the SEC vs. Telegram case, a judge has ordered.

Telegram vice president Ilya Perekopsky, who was reportedly responsible for communications with investors during Telegram's $1.7 billion token pre-sales last year, should also be questioned on Dec. 16 in London, the order states.

The third person listed to provide pre-trial testimony is Shyam Parekh, a Telegram employee who's name was on Telegram's letters to investors that were leaked after the SEC sued the company, one of the investors told CoinDesk.

The SEC sued Telegram in October, demanding that the messaging app company's blockchain project TON be halted and the tokens allocated to the project's investors not be distributed.

The regulator said that Telegram woul flood the U.S. market with unregistered securities and make them available to retail investors.

Telegram disagreed with the SEC, arguing that it properly registered the token sale under Regulation D, and the token itself, once issued, "Will merely be a currency or commodity," not a security.

The company agreed to postpone the project's launch, previously scheduled for the end of October, until April, 2020, so the SEC case can be resolved.

TON investors approved the delay, refusing an offer of a partial refund.

The project has been still been progressing in the background releasing the code for the TON blockchain nodes in early September and instructing the investors to generate their public keys and send them to the company for the scheduled gram token distribution.

According to court filings, a major custody provider for grams, Gram Vault, has also filed paperwork for listing the token on Poloniex.