BlackRock may be preparing to launch a spot Ethereum (ETH) ETF amid roaring confidence that its spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETF application is all but certain, a new company registration suggests.
The price of ETH has soared 8% on the day to $2,020.
- As shown by @SummersThings on Twitter, BlackRock registered a corporation named the “iShares Ethereum Trust” in Delaware on Thursday.
- The name rings similar to its iShares Bitcoin Trust, a spot Bitcoin ETF product currently under review by regulators.
- The latter was registered in Delaware just one week before BlackRock officially filed for its Bitcoin ETF in June, meaning its latest Ethereum Trust filing may be followed by the same.
- The June filing caused Bitcoin’s price to roar to $30,000 at the time, and inspired close to a dozen rival asset managers to try their hand at similar applications – including Fidelity and Franklin Templeton.
- Yet BlackRock isn’t first in the Ethereum ETF race: so far, names like VanEck, Ark/ 21Shares, and Galaxy/ Invesco have already filed for the same product. Similarly, Grayscale is now attempting to convert its Ethereum Trust – which holds over $5 billion in ETH – into a spot ETF.
- Ethereum futures ETFs reached the U.S. market for the first time in early October, though their trading volume proved lackluster.
- Though the SEC has approved no spot crypto ETFs to date, Bloomberg ETF analysts James Seyffart and Eric Balchunas predict that a spot Bitcoin ETF is 90% likely to be approved by early January.
- Balchunas noted that the price of ETH soared on Thursday before news publicly broke of BlackRock’s new registration.
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“Somebody caught this news early and made a pretty penny,” suggested Seyffart.
- The price of BTC also surged on Thursday to an 18-month high of nearly $38,000.