Crypto asset manager Bitwise is advocating for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to delay approving a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) tracking Ether, the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain.
Bitwise, which launched its own spot Bitcoin ETF in January, believes the traditional finance world is still getting up to speed on Bitcoin and may not be ready to properly evaluate an Ether product just yet.
Chief Investment Officer at Bitwise, in an interview with Forbes, Matt Hougan said:
“I feel very confident we’ll get an ether ETF. It’s hard to get financial advisors to think about Ethereum right now. We just went through the Dencun upgrade, which in my mind opens the world to a Cambrian explosion of incredible applications and is a massive deal, and it hasn’t come up once in conversations over the past week, and I’ve been on the road all week.
Challenges In Evaluating Ethereum
Bitwise believes traditional finance is still wrapping its head around Bitcoin as a legitimate asset class. Ethereum’s more advanced use cases as a decentralized computing platform may prove too much for advisors to digest simultaneously.
Hougan stated that while advisors are beginning to understand Bitcoin is not just used for purchases, the idea of Ethereum being a complete blockchain for building apps with a unique burn mechanism is still a larger conceptual leap.
The crypto veteran believes an Ether ETF approved in December or later would likely see much stronger demand than a product rushed to market in May when several issuers have indicated they may launch competing offerings.
Despite his hesitation on the timing, Hougan made clear that Bitwise plans to be a “big player” in the Ether ETF arena once it feels the market is ready, stating “We intend to get there and file. We just haven’t gotten to it yet.”
While contrarian, Bitwise’s stance highlights the complexity in educating the financial establishment on novel crypto assets beyond Bitcoin. With spot Bitcoin ETF over $2 billion raised since its January debut, Hougan argues successful marketing of an ETH fund will require giving advisors more runway to understand Ethereum’s unique value proposition first.