Vanguard refuses to offer shares of spot ETH ETFs in case of their approval

What’s new? US investment giant Vanguard will not add shares of ETH-based spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) to its platform if they are approved. According to the company, cryptocurrency products do not fit into its well-balanced long-term investment portfolio.

Material by Blockworks

What else is known? Vanguard emphasized that it constantly evaluates its brokerage offerings and strives to bring new products to the market, but ETH ETF shares will not be available for purchase on the platform.

Last week, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved Form 194-b trading rule change applications filed by stock exchanges on behalf of potential issuers of spot ETH ETFs. This caused the market to pick up, although the regulator must also approve Forms S-1 to register new securities from the fund issuers themselves for the products to fully launch.

Analysts are divided on how long that process will take. Some concede that the SEC will drag out the signing for an indefinite period of time, while others believe the launch will take place within the next three months at most, and possibly sooner.

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Vanguard, which manages $7,7 trillion in assets, also previously did not list shares of spot BTC ETFs that were admitted to US stock exchanges on January 11. The products have been highly successful and have accumulated nearly $32 billion worth of bitcoins under their management so far. The only exception is Grayscale’s GBTC fund, which has seen $18 billion in outflows due to high fees.

Vanguard’s competitors, such as Fidelity and Charles Schwab, offer BTC ETF shares to clients. In addition, major investment firms are themselves ETF issuers. These include Fidelity with its FBTC fund and BlackRock with its IBIT product, which currently leads the segment in inflows and trading volume.

However, Vanguard continues to insist that crypto products are inconsistent with the company’s stock, bond, and cash-oriented offerings. According to the company, these are the kind of assets that are key components of a quality portfolio.