Key takeaways:
- The US SEC has postponed deciding on the spot Bitcoin ETF that ARK Investment Management has proposed.
- ARK initially submitted a listing application for the ETF in May, allowing the SEC up to 240 days, or until January 2024, to decide.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has continued examining applications from traditional financial powerhouses like BlackRock and Fidelity while also extending its study of the Ark 21Shares bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) application.
The SEC announced in an August 11 notice that it had extended the time it would take to decide whether or not to authorize a spot crypto ETF in the United States by 21 days following the publication of the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF in the Federal Register.
ARK initially submitted a listing application for the ETF in May, allowing the SEC up to 240 days, or until January 2024, to decide.
An application must show proof of an extensive surveillance-sharing agreement in place with a regulated market of considerable scale to be considered for a listing on the Cboe BZX Exchange, which is ARK Investment Management’s goal.
The SEC previously disapproved of the company’s cryptocurrency ETF proposals, stating that they were not “designed to prevent fraudulent and manipulative acts and practices” or safeguard investors. The SEC said:
“The regulated market of significant size test does not require that the spot bitcoin market be regulated in order for the Commission to approve this proposal, and precedent makes clear that an underlying market for a spot commodity or currency being a regulated market would actually be an exception to the norm,”
In an interview on August 7, the founder and CEO of ARK Investment Management, Cathie Wood, predicted that the SEC would postpone making a judgment. However, she also anticipated that at some point in the future, the commission would approve several spot Bitcoin ETFs at once.
ARK Investment Management is one of many US companies applying to offer a spot Bitcoin ETF on a regulated exchange. Notably, the world’s largest asset management company, BlackRock, submitted its own application in July.
Following concerns that SEC authorities could be more amenable to admitting a spot Bitcoin ETF under those circumstances, several companies also revised their current applications to include cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase as a surveillance-sharing partner.
The SEC has not yet authorized any spot crypto ETF applications for listing shares in the United States, but it will start to accept investment vehicles tied to BTC futures in October 2021. The SEC’s reluctance to permit Grayscale to list its Bitcoin Trust as a spot Bitcoin ETF has led to a legal dispute between the two parties.
