VanEck Files for Solana ETF in US, Following Bitcoin and Ethereum Approvals
VanEck filed an S-1 registration statement on Thursday for its “VanEck Solana Belief”—the primary public try to launch a spot Solana (SOL) ETF in america.
The prospectus states that the product might be an “exchange-traded fund” designed to “replicate the efficiency of the worth of Solana” by backing the Belief’s shares straight with SOL tokens. VanEck intends to record the ETF on the Cboe BZX Trade.
“Neither the Belief nor the Sponsor… will interact in any motion the place any portion of the Belief’s SOL is used to earn staking rewards, to earn further SOL or to generate earnings or different earnings,” the assertion clarified.
The submitting comes after the U.S. Securities and Trade Fee (SEC) permitted 19b-4 purposes from nationwide exchanges final month permitting them to record spot Ethereum ETFs on their platforms. The S-1 statements for mentioned Ethereum ETFs have but to be greenlit, although the company’s feedback and knowledgeable evaluation recommend they could go live by next week.
Matthew Sigel, VanEck’s head of digital asset analysis, wrote in a tweet that the agency views Solana as a competitor to Ethereum and a sexy ETF providing due to its “excessive throughput, low charges, strong safety, and a robust group vibe.”
The agency additionally views the SOL token as a clear-cut commodity, regardless of the SEC’s repeated claims in court docket that the asset needs to be categorized as a safety.
“We consider the native token, SOL, capabilities equally to different digital commodities comparable to Bitcoin and ETH,” Sigel tweeted Thursday. “Like Ether on the Ethereum community, SOL will be traded on digital asset platforms or utilized in peer-to-peer transactions.”
After months of radio silence on the matter, the crypto business was shocked to see the SEC expedite approval for Ethereum ETFs final month, moments earlier than their deadline to succeed in a call on the matter.
The sudden pivot, adopted by a closure of their investigation into Ethereum software program big Consensys relating to ETH’s safety standing, has boosted industry confidence that the company might have opened the floodgates to an enormous array of crypto asset ETFs. (Disclosure: Consensys is certainly one of 22 buyers in Decrypt.)
The SEC’s lawsuits towards crypto exchanges like Coinbase, Binance, and Kraken nonetheless stay—as do its claims inside these lawsuits that SOL passes the Howey Take a look at, thus making it a safety within the company’s eyes. Nonetheless, specialists consider that with Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs already permitted, making a coherent case to disclaim Solana the identical product is a steep uphill battle.
“Assuming the SEC offers last approval of ETH ETFs, it’s fairly onerous to see the way it can deny approval to Solana ETFs, on condition that they perform in basically equivalent methods, particularly from the SEC’s perspective,” mentioned College of Kentucky legislation professor Brian L. Frye in a message to Decrypt.
That mentioned, the SEC’s prolonged approval course of means Solana ETFs might not go reside for some time after VanEck’s software. Moreover, the SEC’s lack of enthusiasm about crypto might make that approval course of even slower, the professor mentioned.
“I feel the SEC below present management is approving these ETFs solely reluctantly as a result of it doesn’t actually see any sensible approach to keep away from it,” Frye concluded.
Edited by Andrew Hayward
This story was up to date after publication with further particulars.
