AMC Entertainment CEO Adam Aron on Friday called on Robinhood to immediately stop trading tokens linked to AMC shares, threatening legal action and questioning whether the products comply with U.S. securities laws.
Aron escalated the dispute in a series of posts on X, days after first criticizing Robinhood’s tokenized stock products on Thursday. Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev responded by asking “what’s the concern?” on the same platform.
“Your setting up some kind of fictitious synthetic equity market decouples stock token ownership from a company’s ability to control its own capital raising efforts,” Aron wrote. He called the practice “contemptible” and “outrageous” and said AMC plans to raise the issue with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Aron said AMC has no connection to Robinhood’s tokenized shares and did not authorize the product. He called on Robinhood to “cease and desist” trading AMC stock tokens.
How the tokens work
Robinhood’s stock tokens provide economic exposure to U.S. equities through derivatives, without giving holders ownership of the underlying shares. The tokens are issued through a special-purpose vehicle and are not available to U.S.-based customers. They trade on blockchain rails using an offshore structure based in Jersey.
The distinction matters. A synthetic token can track AMC’s share price without carrying voting rights, providing ownership, or appearing on the company’s shareholder register. Aron argued this structure could undermine AMC’s ability to raise capital and strip investors of conventional shareholder protections.
“This quasi-fake market you are creating on the island of Jersey sows distrust amongst the public about financial markets in general,” Aron wrote to Tenev.
Stock tokens can take several forms across the industry. Some providers create synthetic wrappers that track a stock’s price without the token being a registered share. Other models tokenize shares held with a regulated custodian, while issuer-sponsored approaches put actual company shares onchain with shareholder rights attached. Robinhood’s offering falls into the first category, the one that creates the most distance between the token and the underlying equity.
The key issue is that synthetic tokens create a parallel market that uses a company’s name and brand without the company’s participation or consent. For AMC, which has relied heavily on its retail investor base and stock price movements for capital raises, the creation of an unauthorized derivative market around its shares is particularly sensitive.
Tokenization industry weighs in
Aron’s criticism found support from some crypto executives who otherwise favor bringing stocks onchain. Armani Ferrante, co-founder and CEO of Backpack, said Aron’s concern about capital formation had “real substance.” Backpack offers tokenized U.S. equities on Solana backed by shares held in custody, a model that differs from Robinhood’s synthetic approach.
“Buying a token does not necessarily result in the same amount of buying in the company’s shares,” Ferrante wrote on X, arguing that Robinhood’s structure could separate demand for the token from demand for the underlying stock.
Graham Rodford, CEO of U.K.-regulated exchange Archax, drew a sharper distinction between tokenizing actual shares and creating instruments that track them. Carlos Domingo, CEO of Securitize, pointed to a wide price dislocation in one AMC-linked token that traded at roughly 60 times AMC’s reference share price.
The price dislocation highlights a core risk with synthetic tokens. Without direct backing or arbitrage mechanisms tied to the underlying stock, token prices can drift far from the shares they claim to represent. In a market where AMC tokens trade at 60x the real stock price, the product is functionally disconnected from the equity it references.
The broader tokenized stock market has grown to $3.6 billion. Analysts project it could reach trillions by the end of the decade as crypto firms, fintechs, and Wall Street institutions race to put equities on blockchain infrastructure. That growth makes the regulatory questions raised by the AMC dispute more urgent for the entire industry.
Regulatory questions ahead
Aron questioned whether Robinhood’s offshore structure and derivative-based model comply with U.S. securities regulations. AMC said it would consult outside securities counsel on the matter.
Robinhood has not publicly responded to Aron’s latest statements beyond Tenev’s initial post. The company launched its tokenized stock products earlier this year, covering more than 190 companies, and has not disclosed its full regulatory strategy for the offering.
The SEC has not commented on the specific products, but the broader question of how existing securities laws apply to tokenized equities is an active area of regulatory attention. Tokenization platforms that use custodial backing, like Securitize and Archax, argue their models are more defensible because they tie tokens to actual registered shares.
The dispute also raises questions about fiduciary duty. If token holders believe they own a piece of AMC but actually hold a synthetic derivative with no voting rights, the gap between perception and legal reality could expose platforms to investor claims. That risk grows as the tokenized stock market scales and more retail investors enter.
AMC’s stock jumped after Aron’s initial criticism on Thursday, suggesting the publicity drew attention to the token controversy. The company’s share price has been volatile throughout 2026, and the token dispute adds yet another layer of uncertainty for its investors.
The dispute cuts into a growing fault line in crypto. As tokenization gains traction, the question of whose consent is needed to bring a stock onchain, and what rights token holders actually receive, is becoming harder to ignore across the entire digital asset industry. Robinhood’s move into tokenized equities may have been a first-mover play, but the AMC controversy shows the legal and reputational costs of building that market without issuer buy-in.
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