On July 21, 2017, following last June’s announcement that the Delaware House of Representatives had passed (with near unanimity) blockchain-related provisions proposing to amend several sections of the Delaware General Corporation Law (DGCL), the Delaware Governor officially signed the legislation into law.
The newly enacted legislation provides, among other things, specific statutory authority for Delaware corporations to use “distributed electronic networks or databases,” aka distributed ledgers or blockchain technology, for the creation and maintenance of corporate records, including the corporations’ stock ledger.[2]
1. The Use of Blockchain Technology for the Creation and Administration of Corporate Records
Section 219(c) of the DGCL provides that a stock ledger of a Delaware corporation is the only evidence of the identity of stockholders of the corporation who are entitled to inspect the list of stockholders and to vote at meetings.
Until now, under current recordkeeping practice, the stock ledger of a corporation could only be created and maintained by a corporate secretary or a corporation’s transfer agent. Often, a stock ledger consists of a capitalization table, i.e., electronically encoded data on a computer program like Microsoft Excel, which is producible in printed form. Continue Reading Delaware Governor Signs Groundbreaking Blockchain Legislation into Law