The SEC unexpectedly announced today that they would be delaying a decision to approve or deny the ETF applications for VanEck and Solid X.
The SEC cited a need to gather more information from the public as one of the reasons for the ETFs delay:
“Institution of such proceedings is appropriate at this time in view of the legal and policy issues raised by the proposed rule change. Institution of proceedings does not indicate that the Commission has reached any conclusions with respect to any of the issues involved. Rather, as described below, the Commission seeks and encourages interested persons to provide comments on the proposed rule change.”
The ETF decision has now been extended for another 180 days, with the ability to issue a 60-day extension after that.
To date, more than 9 ETF applications have been rejected or delayed by the SEC, including an ETF from Gemini Company (owned by the Winkle Voss’s), the ProShares ETF’s and ETFs proposed by Granite Shares & Direxion.
The primary reasons for each rejection or delay have been the risk of market manipulation & fraud.
We can now be certain that a Bitcoin ETF will not be introduced to the market until at least 2019. This should provide ample time for the SEC to thoroughly evaluate, and for more investors to accumulate in anticipation of a 2019 ETF approval.