AMC Entertainment shares surged more than 15% in premarket trading on Friday, reaching $2.92. The cause was not a financial report or a business breakthrough, but a public conflict between the company's CEO Adam Aron and Robinhood CEO Vladislav Tenev. At the center of the dispute are tokenized versions of AMC shares that the platform offers to its clients.
The essence of the conflict: ownership rights versus speculation
Aron harshly criticized Robinhood for issuing tokens that track the price of AMC shares and more than 190 other companies. According to him, these instruments replicate value through an offshore structure but give holders neither voting rights nor real ownership of the underlying asset. The AMC CEO demanded an immediate halt to trading such tokens, calling the practice "unacceptable" and "outrageous."
Tenev responded laconically: "What's the problem?" — but Aron did not limit himself to rhetoric. He emphasized that AMC spends millions annually on compliance with U.S. securities laws, while Robinhood issues tokens from the island of Jersey, located approximately 5,000 km from U.S. jurisdiction. The AMC CEO also stated that the company's legal team is already exploring the possibility of enforcement measures, and a request has been sent to the SEC.
Numbers that speak louder than words
The scale of Aron's criticism becomes clear when looking at the data. The largest pool of tokenized AMC on Robinhood Chain shows liquidity of only about $382,600, and the token's market capitalization approaches a modest $2.8 million. For comparison: AMC's own market capitalization is approximately $2.6 billion with 893 million shares. In other words, the token market is a grain of sand compared to the real company, but even it can move quotes.
Friday's jump is the most striking test of the hypothesis of whether meme coins and tokenized assets can influence real prices. Over the week, AMC shares still fell by 5.93%, fluctuating in the range of $2.50–2.72 before the sharp rise followed. It is worth noting that this is not the first such incident: earlier, OpenAI also expressed dissatisfaction with the appearance of its tokens on Robinhood, pointing to the lack of connection with the company's capital.
My analysis: The situation exposes the growing tension between traditional markets and decentralized financial instruments. While the token market is too small to seriously threaten the capitalization of public companies, the precedent itself creates a dangerous precedent. If the SEC intervenes, it could become a turning point for the entire tokenized assets industry — the question is only who blinks first: the regulator or platforms playing on the edge of the law.