Multiple reports corroborate that the SEC could approve a Bitcoin Futures Exchange-Traded Fund next week and the regulator is reportedly no longer opposed to these products.
These reports – of course among other factors, are currently breeding huge positive price changes for Bitcoin. They are solidifying the claims by the BTC price stock-to-flow model, whose creator, a pseudo-anonymous bitcoin analyst called PlanB, and British cryptographer Adam Back opined that Bitcoin would attain a $100,000 price by year-end. Anthony Pompliano, not basing his prediction on ETFs just like these two do not, also says Bitcoin could attain that price mark this year.
US SEC Chairman Gary Gensler is reported as saying that the commission would approve an ETF based on the CME-traded Bitcoin futures. He also stated that the regulation of mutual funds could guarantee significant investor protections in the Bitcoin ETFs. That said, the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF adheres to all the regulations of mutual funds. Together, these signify the possibility of an impending approval of a Bitcoin ETF. Previous ETFs have been denied with claims that they do not provide such protections to investors.
Hours after a report by Bloomberg saying that approval was pending, Bitcoin rallied past $60,000 for the first time since April. The source quoted people familiar with the matter. BTC is now up by over 11 percent in a week.
Of course, approval of the Bitcoin Futures caused huge BTC price spikes in 2017, prompting the digital asset to crack $20,000. A Bitcoin ETF would obviously be expected to have higher effects on spot price given that it is a Bitcoin physically delivered product – it will improve demand of the crypto asset directly. The ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF, in particular, is based on futures contracts. The price of the share would increase if the BTC price hikes, and vice versa. However, there would be no physical delivery of Bitcoin.
In other words, the US SEC favors a futures-based fund that involves people betting on Bitcoin by trading contracts whose value derives on BTC price, instead of one that involves a physical ETF that would involve physical owning and delivery of actual Bitcoins. Although the former is expected to give a new ray of hope to Bitcoin proponents by affecting prices positively, the latter would be more than a piece of welcome news for them because it is more directly tied to BTC demand than the former.
Many Bitcoiners had also called out the SEC for lagging in approving an ETF since 2020, at a time when multiple Crypto ETFs were approved across Europe and Canada. And after several rejections, many believe that the US could approve as many as up to four ETFs next week. These include Invesco Bitcoin Strategy ETF, VanEck Bitcoin Strategy ETF, and Valkyrie Bitcoin Strategy ETF in addition to the ProShares ETF.
However, the US SEC could still reject or delay the applications to 2022. In August, SEC said that the approval was not to be done any time soon.
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