The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has reportedly approved Overstock's plans to issue stock via the blockchain through its subsidiary tØ platform.

According to Wired, the company was granted an amended Form S-3 – a requirement solely for companies that report under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 – meaning that it could now issue public securities leveraging blockchain technology.

It is still unclear when the company will issue its first public security on a distributed ledger but Patrick Byrne, Overstock's CEO, told Wired:

Submitted back in April, Overstock's S-3 form application filing outlined how the online retail giant was planning on issuing new stocks or securities, possibly amounting to as much as $500m.

The reports of the approval come after Byrne revealed Overstock's long-awaited blockchain-based private and public equities trading platform – known as tØ – in August this year at Nasdaq's New York headquarters.

According to the US retailer's latest quarterly reports, released in November, Overstock spent $3.2m on its blockchain securities initiative during the previous three months.

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