United States regulators have given the final sign-off for spot exchange-traded funds that hold Ethereum’s Ether (ETH), which can begin trading on July 23 after a seesaw of edits to registration statements.
On July 22, the Securities and Exchange Commission approved the S-1 documents from BlackRock, Fidelity, 21Shares, Bitwise, Franklin Templeton, VanEck, and Invesco Galaxy required to launch their respective ETFs on stock exchanges, including the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Nasdaq, and Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE).
Registration for Grayscale’s Ethereum Trust and Ethereum Mini Trust also became effective on Monday, opening the door for investors to access these Ethereum-focused investment vehicles.
This final approval comes two months after the SEC’s May 23 decision to greenlight the 19b-4 applications, which involved a rule change allowing spot Ether ETFs to be listed and traded on exchanges.
The Grayscale Ethereum Trust will maintain a base fee outside the typical range, while other spot Ether ETFs will offer fees between 0.15% and 0.25%. Several issuers, including Fidelity, 21Shares, Bitwise, Franklin, and VanEck, are waiving fees initially, either for a set period or until their products reach a specified level of assets under management.
Additionally, the Grayscale Ethereum Mini Trust will also offer a fee waiver for the first six months or until it reaches $2 billion in assets.
The approval marks a major win for the crypto industry, following years of effort to gain regulatory acceptance. This decision comes on the heels of the SEC’s approval of Bitcoin ETFs in January. Those funds holding the largest crypto by value have already attracted tens of billions of dollars in investments, suggesting a strong potential demand for similar Ether-based products.
At the time of writing, the second-largest crypto by market capitalization trades at $3,451.05, up 1.9% over the last seven days, per CoinGecko.