Ether jumped 20 percent on Tuesday – trimmed part of the advance. The leap tracked a surge in the probability that the Securities but also Exchange Commission will clear a spot ether exchange traded fund.
The regulator told Nasdaq, Cboe along with NYSE Arca to revise the 19b-4 filings for eight proposed spot ether ETFs on an expedited schedule. The same directive preceded the January approval of spot bitcoin ETFs.
Fidelity removed language that would have allowed the trust to stake ether and pass the rewards to shareholders. The SEC has argued that staking services constitute investment contracts – the deletion lowers a potential hurdle.
Bloomberg Intelligence raised its approval odds for the 19b-4 forms to 75 percent on Monday, up from 25 percent. Polymarket contracts that pay out if a spot ether ETF launches before 1 July traded from 10 cents to 60 cents on the dollar.
The first deadline arrives on Thursday, when the commission must approve, deny, or delay VanEck’s proposal. Even if the order is favorable, the regulator must still sign off on separate registration statements before any fund lists. Issuers and counsel expect that process to last weeks or months.
Van Buren Capital general partner Scott Johnsson wrote on X that the retention of the commodity-grantor-trust structure in every filing signals the SEC no longer intends to treat ether as a security.