---
description: CFTC treated Ooki DAO as an unincorporated association with general partnership liability imposing $643K penalty — strongest negative precedent for unwrapped DAOs, but the double-edged sword of governance participation creating liability may also support the active management defense
type: claim
domain: internet-finance
created: 2026-03-05
confidence: proven
source: "CFTC v. Ooki DAO (N.D. Cal. June 2023), Sarcuni v. bZx DAO (S.D. Cal. 2023)"
---

# Ooki DAO proved that DAOs without legal wrappers face general partnership liability making entity structure a prerequisite for any futarchy-governed vehicle

The CFTC's enforcement action against Ooki DAO (formerly bZx) in 2022-2023 established two critical precedents:

**DAOs are legal persons.** The court held that a DAO is a "person" under the Commodity Exchange Act and can be held liable. The CFTC alleged Ooki DAO was an "unincorporated association" of token holders who voted on governance proposals.

**Governance participants face personal liability.** Token holders who participated in governance could be personally liable for the DAO's actions. A separate class action (Sarcuni v. bZx DAO, S.D. Cal. 2023) found sufficient facts to allege a general partnership existed among bZx DAO tokenholders — meaning joint and several liability for all participants.

The penalty: $643,542 and permanent trading bans.

## Why this matters for futarchy

Every metaDAO project that operates without a legal entity wrapper is exposed to this precedent. Since [[MetaDAOs Cayman SPC houses all launched projects as ring-fenced SegCos under a single entity with MetaDAO LLC as sole Director]], the MetaDAO ecosystem has already addressed this — projects launch as Cayman SegCos or Marshall Islands DAO LLCs. But the lesson is structural: **entity wrapping is not a legal nicety, it's a liability shield.**

For Living Capital specifically, since [[two legal paths through MetaDAO create a governance binding spectrum from commercially reasonable efforts to legally binding and determinative]], choosing the stronger binding path (Marshall Islands DAO LLC with "legally binding and determinative" language) provides both governance commitment AND liability protection.

## The double-edged sword

Ooki DAO actually helps the futarchy "active management" argument in one way: the court took governance participation seriously enough to impose liability. If courts treat prediction market participation as meaningful governance (enough to create liability), they may also treat it as meaningful active management (enough to defeat the "efforts of others" prong of Howey).

The argument: you cannot simultaneously hold that governance participation creates liability AND that it's too passive to constitute active management. Since [[the DAO Reports rejection of voting as active management is the central legal hurdle for futarchy because prediction market trading must prove fundamentally more meaningful than token voting]], the tension between The DAO Report (voting ≠ active management) and Ooki DAO (voting = liability-creating participation) is one the SEC has not resolved.

## The regulatory evasion risk

The CFTC explicitly alleged that bZeroX transferred operations to Ooki DAO "to attempt to render the bZx DAO, by its decentralized nature, enforcement-proof." Courts are hostile to structures designed primarily to avoid regulation. This means any futarchy-governed vehicle must demonstrate that the structure serves legitimate governance purposes, not just regulatory evasion.

Since [[futarchy solves trustless joint ownership not just better decision-making]], the argument is that futarchy is genuinely superior governance — it solves the coordination problem of multiple parties co-owning assets without trust or legal systems. This is not a compliance trick. It is a mechanism design innovation with regulatory defensibility as a consequence, not as the purpose.

## Implications for Living Capital design

1. **Entity wrapper is non-negotiable** — every Living Capital vehicle needs a legal entity (RMI DAO LLC or Cayman SegCo)
2. **Operating agreement must bind to futarchy** — otherwise the entity provides liability protection but not governance credibility
3. **Governance participation should be documented** — on-chain evidence of broad market participation strengthens the active management defense
4. **Anti-evasion framing matters** — lead with "this is better governance" not "this avoids regulation"

---

Relevant Notes:
- [[MetaDAOs Cayman SPC houses all launched projects as ring-fenced SegCos under a single entity with MetaDAO LLC as sole Director]] — how MetaDAO addresses the entity wrapper requirement
- [[two legal paths through MetaDAO create a governance binding spectrum from commercially reasonable efforts to legally binding and determinative]] — the spectrum of legal binding that Ooki DAO makes critical
- [[futarchy solves trustless joint ownership not just better decision-making]] — the legitimate governance purpose that distinguishes futarchy from regulatory evasion
- [[Solomon Labs takes the Marshall Islands DAO LLC path with the strongest futarchy binding language making governance outcomes legally binding and determinative]] — strongest current implementation
- [[MetaDAOs three-layer legal hierarchy separates formation agreements from contractual relationships from regulatory armor with each layer using different enforcement mechanisms]] — the full legal architecture

Topics:
- [[living capital]]
- [[internet finance and decision markets]]
