Asset management firm Hashdex has reportedly engaged with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to address concerns related to its application for the Hashdex Bitcoin Futures exchange-traded fund (ETF), which aims to hold spot Bitcoin. According to an insider, the meeting occurred on October 13 and involved six SEC officials, representatives from Hashdex, NYSE Arca, Tidal Financial Group, and law firm K&L Gates. The gathering provided an opportunity for Hashdex to outline its mechanism for incorporating spot Bitcoin within an ETF on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), which is overseen by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
What sets Hashdex’s filing apart from other spot Bitcoin applications is its absence of a surveillance-sharing agreement with cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase. Instead, Hashdex proposed acquiring spot BTC from physical exchanges within the CME market, making it entirely reliant on CME for trading pricing, as per NYSE Arca’s SEC filing in late August. A presentation shared with SEC officials revealed that this strategy aligns with the commission's Teucrium order, which suggested that the Bitcoin futures market is sufficiently developed to support investment products related to BTC.
The next step involves the SEC possibly seeking additional information, with the initial deadline for filings slated for November 17. Hashdex, boasting more than $380 million in assets under management, has already obtained approval for its Bitcoin futures ETF in April 2022, which has been listed on NYSE Arca since September of the preceding year. If the rule change gains approval, ETFs will have the capacity to include spot Bitcoin.
Numerous major asset management firms are actively competing to list the first spot Bitcoin ETF in the United States. BlackRock's ETF proposal recently emerged in the public domain through the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), a sign that approval could be forthcoming. It appears that the consensus among insiders is that the SEC will potentially greenlight all spot ETFs within the span of three months.
