BlackRock’s spot BTC ETF has been assigned the IBIT ticker

The company supplemented its filing to the SEC after several meetings with officials

19.12.2023 - 09:35

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2 min

What’s new? A spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) from the world’s largest investment company BlackRock has been assigned the IBIT ticker. Information about this is contained in the updated product launch filing for the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In addition, the document includes information on the mechanism of issue and redemption of the fund’s shares. According to Bloomberg analyst Eric Balchunas, so far the document suggests that users will only be able to receive cash, but not bitcoins, when redeeming shares.

Application for the SEC

What else is known? BlackRock writes in its filing that, subject to regulatory approval, redemptions could also be made in bitcoins. For now, however, the cash redemption option remains preferable to the SEC, which would require the company to withdraw bitcoins from the vault and sell them, only to then, return the cash to investors when redeeming shares. The updated filing was also preceded by several meetings between BlackRock representatives and SEC officials.

Balchunas explains that issuing additional shares would require the company to exchange cash for bitcoins and reverse the transactions at redemption. Thus, unlike most other exchange-traded funds, it will not be able to make in-kind payments to investors.

Source: Twitter.com

In addition, the SEC has launched public discussions on the topic of launching Ethereum-based spot or mixed funds from Grayscale, Hashdex, VanEck, ARK Invest, and 21 Shares. Futures-based cryptocurrency exchange-traded funds, unlike spot funds, are already authorized in the United States.

Earlier, ETF Store president Nate Geraci said that the approval of spot crypto ETFs in the US would turn into a “bloodbath” for local crypto exchanges, as the fees for trading fund shares would be significantly lower than the fees of crypto platforms.

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