On May 26th, Henry Jim, an ETF analyst at Bloomberg, tweeted that Ark-21Shares decided to file a new spot Bitcoin ETF. The re-filing comes a few weeks after their first application for a Spot BTC ETF was rejected.
Ark-21Shares Applies for Bitcoin ETF
Earlier yesterday, Henry Jim noted that Ark-21Shares applied for a spot BTC ETF. In his tweet, Jim said,
“Ark-21Shares decides to try again for a “Spot” Bitcoin ETF and files 19b-4 with SEC. Deadline for approval / disapproval: Jan 24, 2023 (latest). Deadlines: 2022.07.13 2022.08.27 2022.11.24 2023.01.24.”
Ark investments is an American investment management company founded by Cathie wood. According to recent reports, this company is trying to launch a spot BTC ETF in collaboration with 21Shares.
According to SEC filings, this company submitted another application for a physical Bitcoin ETF on May 13th. The tweet by Jim indicates that the deadline for approving or disapproving this Bitcoin ETF is January 24th, 2023. This new application in partnership with 21Shares came a few weeks after the SEC rejected the first Ark-21Shares ETF application.
Approval Under Proposed Rule Change
According to reports, this new application targets approval under the proposed new rule change from the BZX rule 14.11(e)(4) for listing commodity-based trusted shares under the Cboe BZX Exchange. The SEC rejected multiple Bitcoin ETFs with concerns about investors’ security in the past.
Ark-21Shares’ first rejected attempt was filed under the Securities Exchange Act of 1933. However, according to reports, while the SEC rejected many applications, it has already approved a few, including Teucrium and Valkyrie’s XBTO BTC futures fund filed under the Securities exchanges Act of 1934.
The idea of a spot bitcoin ETF is basically that the investment commodity can track the real-time BTC price in spot markets. The application says, “In seeking to achieve its investment objective, the trust will hold Bitcoin and value the shares daily based on the index.”
While SEC has mostly been approving futures BTC ETFs, it has not yet approved a single spot crypto ETF. The SEC will unlikely change its ETF approval, especially considering its negative stance against crypto.
Grayscale, another American investment company, applied for Bitcoin Spot ETFs a few months ago. Like in Ark-21Shares, the Grayscale application has not been approved. But, according to reports, the deadline for approval is July 6th.
US Lagging While Others Approve Spot Bitcoin ETFs
While the US is continually delaying the approval of a Spot Bitcoin ETF, other countries have already approved the same. In March, for instance, Fidelity, an investment company based in Canada, launched its first spot Bitcoin ETF. Other countries like Australia and Switzerland also approved a Spot Bitcoin ETF. Although the SEC seems to be much more concerned about the investors’ financial security, this move focuses on clumping down the crypto space.
Source: https://crypto.news/ark-21shares-spot-bitcoin-etf-first-application/