The NYSE withdrew its Natural Asset Company proposal in January 2024. The official story: concerns about foreign ownership and public land access. The real story: extractive industries killed a competitive threat.
Understanding what actually happened — and why — reveals the opportunity that remains.
what NACs actually were
Natural Asset Companies were designed to hold rights to ecosystem services, not buy land. The structure:
- Landowners retain property ownership and authority
- They license ecosystem-service rights to the NAC
- The NAC manages ecological performance and generates capital
- Investors buy shares in the NAC's ecological productivity
This is structurally similar to mineral rights leasing — except for conservation instead of extraction. A rancher could license grazing land's carbon sequestration, water filtration, and biodiversity value to a NAC while continuing to ranch.
The Costa Rica pilot demonstrated this: the government would contribute ecological rights from national lands into a NAC structure, not sell the land itself. Sovereign partnership, not acquisition.
NACs held rights to the value of natural assets and the ecosystem services they produce — not fee-simple ownership of land.
what the opposition claimed
Critics framed NACs as a threat to property rights and national security:
- "Lock up" public lands from productive use
- Allow foreign sovereign wealth funds to control American resources
- Remove land from farming, ranching, mining, and energy extraction
- Undermine rural economies
The framing worked. 35,000+ comment letters. Bipartisan political opposition. NYSE withdrawal.
what actually happened
The opposition came overwhelmingly from extractive industries — oil, gas, mining, logging — and the politicians who represent them.
Their real concern wasn't property rights. It was competition.
NACs threatened to create a market mechanism where conservation could outbid extraction for land use rights. If ecosystem services — carbon sequestration, water filtration, biodiversity, flood control — are worth more than what extraction pays, the free market says conservation wins.
That's the threat. Not foreign ownership. Not land lockup. Competition.
Extraction industries have enjoyed below-market access to public lands for decades. Federal grazing fees are famously subsidized. Mining claims on public land still operate under 1872 law. NACs threatened to introduce actual market pricing.
The opposition claimed to defend free markets — while arguing against market competition for land use rights.
the property rights contradiction
Notice the logical problem: if you're a property rights advocate, why oppose a private landowner's freedom to license ecosystem services?
The NAC structure explicitly preserved landowner ownership and authority. Participation was voluntary. This is consistent with strong property-rights ideology.
But the opposition narrative sidestepped this nuance by focusing on public lands and worst-case scenarios. The real flashpoint was BLM's proposed "Conservation and Landscape Health" rule, which would allow conservation leases on public lands. Critics tied NACs to this policy — correctly seeing that conservation could become a competitive bidder for public land access.
If conservation pays more than extraction for public land leases, and we're running a free market, extraction loses.
a question for elected officials
Politicians and public officials have a fiduciary duty to protect the health, wellbeing, and safety of their communities.
Which serves that duty: pollution, depleted resources, and low-paying boom-bust extraction jobs? Or long-term valuation and protection of the ecosystems that provide clean water, clean air, flood control, and climate stability?
The officials who opposed NACs chose extraction. Their constituents will live with the consequences.
why NACs were vulnerable
NACs had the right thesis: ecosystems produce valuable services, and capital markets can fund their protection. The Costa Rica pilot and IEG's landowner programs demonstrated the model works.
But the architecture was vulnerable:
Centralized listing — NYSE listing required SEC approval. One regulatory chokepoint.
Politically targetable — A single proposal that industry lobbyists could coordinate against.
Dependent on permission — The entire model needed gatekeepers to say yes.
Extraction industries have decades of lobbying infrastructure. They used it. NACs needed permission. Permission was denied.
the alternative that doesn't need permission
Ensurance is a member-owned blended finance protocol for natural capital. It operates on the same thesis as NACs — ecosystem services have economic value, and market mechanisms can fund conservation — but with architecture designed to survive opposition.
| NAC Vulnerability | Ensurance Design |
|---|---|
| NYSE listing required SEC approval | Permissionless — no gatekeepers to lobby |
| Single proposal, single target | Composable — many instruments, many issuers |
| Dependent on regulatory permission | Onchain — operates without asking |
| Opaque corporate governance | Transparent — all flows visible |
| Centralized decision-making | Progressive decentralization |
Ensurance uses the same tools NACs proposed — ownership, leasing, easements, ecosystem-service rights — but deploys them through permissionless infrastructure. The protocol is structured as a Wyoming DUNA (Decentralized Unincorporated Nonprofit Association), providing legal clarity while maintaining decentralized governance.
Want to license your land's ecosystem services? Create an agent. Issue certificates. No NYSE approval required. No SEC filing. No single chokepoint for opponents to target.
how it works
General ensurance (coins) — ERC-20 tokens that fund ecosystem protection broadly. Trading activity generates proceeds that flow to designated beneficiaries. Anyone can participate.
Specific ensurance (certificates) — ERC-1155 tokens tied to individual natural assets. A particular wetland, forest, or watershed. Certificates are yield-bearing and directly fund named places.
Agents — ERC-721 tokens with tokenbound accounts (ERC-6551) representing places, purposes, or stewards. Agents hold assets, receive proceeds, and route value to beneficiaries. Both landowners and natural assets themselves can have agent accounts — group-level and asset-level representation.
The proceeds mechanism inverts extraction economics: instead of depleting natural capital for shareholder returns, trading activity funds conservation and restoration.
the new nature economy
Critics claimed NACs would destroy rural jobs. The opposite is true.
Conservation and stewardship create employment: restoration crews, land managers, monitoring technicians, ecologists, water quality specialists. These jobs are local, cannot be offshored, and serve community health rather than distant shareholders.
The extractive economy didn't build rural prosperity — it extracted value while externalizing costs (pollution, health impacts, depleted resources). A nature economy keeps value local and creates jobs that improve rather than degrade the places where people live.
If conservation pays more than extraction, that's not "locking up" land. That's the market recognizing what's actually valuable.
why this matters now
The $1 trillion annual biodiversity funding gap didn't disappear when NACs did. The need for market mechanisms that fund conservation remains urgent.
NACs proved the thesis could attract serious capital interest. Their defeat proved that permissioned systems are vulnerable to incumbent lobbying.
Ensurance is the same thesis with unkillable architecture. No permission required. No single point of failure. No chokepoint for extraction lobbyists to target.
You can't lobby to kill something that doesn't need permission.
taking action
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Explore ensurance coins — See ecosystem services being funded through market activity → general ensurance
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Review specific certificates — Find natural assets you can fund directly → specific ensurance
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Understand proceeds — See how value routes to conservation → proceeds
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Talk to someone — If you were interested in NACs, we can explain how ensurance achieves the same goals → contact
frequently asked questions
is ensurance just NACs but crypto?
Ensurance shares NACs' thesis — ecosystem services have value, capital markets can fund conservation. But ensurance is a member-owned blended finance protocol, not a corporate structure listed on a stock exchange.
The difference is architecture. NACs needed permission (NYSE listing, SEC approval). Ensurance is permissionless. You can't lobby the SEC to kill a protocol that doesn't need SEC approval.
The crypto infrastructure (ERC-20 coins, ERC-1155 certificates, ERC-721 agents with ERC-6551 tokenbound accounts) enables permissionless participation, transparent governance, and composability with other protocols. These aren't features for their own sake — they're what makes the system unkillable.
does ensurance involve land ownership?
Yes — in multiple ways.
Working with landowners: Landowners retain title and authority over their property. They can create agent accounts, issue certificates tied to their land's ecosystem services, and receive proceeds from market activity. This is the voluntary, property-rights-respecting model NACs proposed.
Acquiring and owning land: Ensurance also acquires land directly, funded by ensurers and underwriters providing capital for real estate. These become protocol-owned real assets.
ENTRUST: The ultimate goal is permanent protection through ENTRUST — where natural assets are secured in perpetuity. Protocol-owned real assets represent nature owning itself, with ecosystem services funding ongoing stewardship.
Both landowners and natural assets can have their own agent accounts — representation at the group level (the landowner or steward organization) and asset level (the specific natural asset).
what about foreign ownership concerns?
Ensurance is transparent and onchain. All participation is visible — every transaction, every holder, every flow.
But here's what matters: we don't care why someone participates.
Any market activity — buying or selling, long or short, speculation or holding — generates proceeds that fund conservation. The motivations are irrelevant. Value is subjective and relational. Someone trading for profit, someone trading for impact, someone trading for speculation — all create the same proceeds.
This is regenerative finance: the system produces conservation outcomes regardless of participant intentions. The architecture creates alignment without requiring alignment.
won't extractive industries oppose ensurance too?
They might. But there's no single proposal to lobby against, no regulator to pressure, no NYSE to withdraw a filing. Permissionless infrastructure doesn't ask for permission. The architecture is designed to be unkillable.
how does this help landowners?
Landowners can create agent accounts for their properties, issue certificates tied to their land's ecosystem services, and receive proceeds from market activity. It's the voluntary, market-based income stream NACs promised — without needing NYSE approval.
Natural assets also get their own agent accounts — the land itself represented onchain, receiving proceeds, and funding its own stewardship. Both the landowner (group agent) and the natural asset (asset agent) can participate in the system.
the bottom line
NACs had the right idea: make ecosystem services investable so capital markets can fund conservation. They were killed by extraction industries protecting subsidized access to public resources.
Ensurance is the same thesis with architecture built to survive opposition. Permissionless. Decentralized. Composable. Member-owned. No chokepoint to lobby. No permission to deny.
The question isn't whether conservation can compete with extraction. It's whether the system allows competition at all. NACs asked permission. Ensurance doesn't.
Conservation is a higher-value use. The free market should recognize that. Now it can.