SEC rejects SkyBridge BTC ETF proposal

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC, has once again rejected a request to list and trade a spot BTC exchange-traded fund (ETF).

This time, the ETF had been proposed in March last year by investment consulting firm First Trust Advisors and SkyBridge, a hedge fund founded by former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci.

The companies have teamed up to try to get ETF approval. But the regulator said in a note that the product did not meet “the requirement that the rules of a national securities exchange be ‘designed to prevent fraud and manipulative acts and practices’ and ‘to protect investors and the public interest’. ”.

The justification is similar to that given by the SEC for reject the Valkyrie and Kryptoin proposals in December 2021.

Prior to that, the regulator had already turned down spot BTC ETF proposals from VanEck and WisdomTree.

SEC rejects spot BTC ETFs

All these rejections are actually not surprising. After all, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler had already indicated his preference for a BTC futures ETF over an ETF that holds BTC itself.

Two of these futures ETFs, ProShares and Valkyrie, began trading in October.

These products were initially received with great enthusiasm by investors with a high volume of trades.

A decision on Fidelity Investment’s proposal for a spot BTC ETF is also expected to be released shortly.

An ETF is an investment product that allows investors to buy shares that represent an asset. In the case of a BTC ETF, investors do not have to handle the asset alone.

That is, they can be exposed to cryptocurrency without having to worry about aspects such as storage and security.

Futures ETFs are different from spot ETFs. This is because its shares represent contracts that bet on the future price of BTC and not on the asset itself.