Greatest risk of Ethereum Merge that is generally overlooked

During the Ripple hearings, the SEC's stance on other cryptocurrencies has been made clear repeatedly: SEC chairman Gary Gensler said Bitcoin is a commodity and not a security because 1) its core properties cannot be changed 2) there is no single entity that controls the asset so that its value is not representative of the performance of this entity.

Mr. Gensler also repeatedly stated, on the record, that the SEC does not consider ETH a security. That is, ETH at present is not under the suspicion of being a security.

Will that change after ETH completely transforms (changes it's core property)? Well, it's anyone's guess, but the fact is the Merge will allow the SEC to disregard it's previous opinion about Ethereum due to the drastic change in the fundamental design

Ok, hypothetically, the SEC files a lawsuit against the Ethereum foundation accusing them of issuing and trading unregistered securities. So what?

Ethereum continues to operate just as it has. The developers remain undeterred, ecosystem unchanged. Maybe a few delistings by some overly compliant CEXes happen. The only aftermath (since the crypto market is so easily spooked) — ETH price drops hard, like really hard, and drags the whole market along down for us to buy in.

For reference, look at the time when SEC VS Ripple was announced.

However, a potential SEC lawsuit against ETH will only take a toll on the price, not the tech, in which case ETH and other cryptocurrencies become (and this is the only context the use of the following phrase should be legally allowed) undervalued.

So I'm actually looking forward to it. We'll all be in for a jackpot if it happens. If it doesn't happen, ETH is a beast that will make us pretty happy in the long run anyway.