In brief
- The SEC will decide on the Truth Social Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF on October 8, likely after a rules change request from two exchanges that could shorten approval processes.
- The agency delayed decisions on XRP funds from Grayscale, Bitwise, CoinShares, Canary Capital, and 21Shares.
- It also pushed back deadlines on separate Dogecoin and Litecoin ETFs, and a proposal to add staking to an existing spot Ethereum ETF.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has delayed its decisions on an exchange-traded fund proposed by Donald Trump’s media and technology company to track the performance of Bitcoin and Ethereum and seven other ETFs based on single digital assets.
In a filing Monday, the regulator said that it moved its deadline back 45 days for weighing in on the Truth Social Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF to October 8.
It announced identical delays for applications filed for spot XRP funds by Grayscale, CoinShares, Canary Capital, Bitwise and 21Shares, a spot Dogecoin ETF from Grayscale, and a spot Litecoin product from CoinShares, although the dates for potential approvals of those funds vary.
It also held up resolving a request to add staking to the the 21Shares Core Ethereum ETF, which tracks the price of the second-largest cryptocurrency by market value.
The delays comes four days after the agency delayed decisions on Solana ETFs from Bitwise, 21Shares, and VanEck, and a Dogecoin fund from 21Shares.
The SEC is weighing a wave of proposals tracking cryptocurrencies. Those submissions have resulted from the dramatic success of 11 spot Bitcoin and nine Ethereum ETFs, a more favorable political environment for cryptocurrencies ushered in by the Trump administration, and growing interest by traditional finance giants who were formerly resistant to the asset.
The filings also follow roughly three weeks after two major U.S. exchanges asked the SEC to approve amendments that could significantly shorten the approval process for future crypto exchange-traded funds, automatically listing certain products without requiring case-by-case filings.
In separate filings, Cboe BZX and NYSE Arca requested changes to their listing standards that would allow certain crypto ETFs to be listed without enduring the SEC’s rigorous evaluation under Rule 19b-4, a process that requires exchanges to submit proposed rule changes. Under current guidelines, such reviews of proposed changes to funds could take 240 days.
Bloomberg Senior ETF Analyst Eric Balchunas told Decrypt that the SEC’s filings Monday were “nothing significant,” and were likely timed to follow a probable SEC green light of Cboe and NYSE’s amendments next month following the conclusion of a comments period.
“Even though it feels like ‘Isn’t this SEC supposed to approve all this stuff?’, the listing standards are out for comment,” Balchunas said. “So just in the nick of time, these listing standards should be approved. And then we’re anticipating a batch of approvals based on the listing standard starting in October.”
“So this delay feels discouraging, but it’s just a little more patience,” he added. “It’ll all happen soon.”
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