Yesterday, news was released regarding VanEck that makes the final approval of spot Ethereum ETFs in the USA increasingly likely in the near future. 

While on one hand the requests for the issuance of a spot ETH ETF in the USA have already been approved by the SEC, the bureaucratic process that leads to the actual listing of their shares on the stock exchange is still ongoing. 

The hypothesis, corroborated by yesterday’s news about VanEck, is that they may debut on the USA stock exchanges on Tuesday, July 2. 

The news about VanEck and the approval of Ethereum ETFs 

The news from yesterday that increased the chances of a stock market debut on July 2nd is related to VanEck’s spot Ethereum ETF.

In fact, the company has sent to the SEC the form 8-A12B of its VanEck Ethereum Trust.

This is a normal procedure that is part of the approval process, but when they presented it for the Bitcoin spot ETF, they did it exactly 7 days before the launch. 

According to Bloomberg’s ETF expert, Eric Balchunas, this should be interpreted as a good sign, because 7 days after the submission of the form for the spot Ethereum ETF, it will be precisely July 2nd.

VanEck just filed 8-A form for spot Eth, which is just part of process, but.. should be noted that they filed their 8-A for spot bitcoin exactly 7 days before launch. Good sign for our July 2nd over/under (7 days from now). But again, anything poss. Sure we'll hear more soon.. https://t.co/2BlkDnWhrz

— Eric Balchunas (@EricBalchunas) June 25, 2024

Furthermore, even the CEO of VanEck, Jan van Eck, seems to be confident. 

Guess where I’m starting my week? pic.twitter.com/Wxch18E41W

— Jan van Eck (@JanvanEck3) June 24, 2024

The hypothesis of July 2nd

The approval of the requests for the issuance of spot Ethereum ETFs in the USA was given by the SEC on May 24. 

At that point, the process of final approval of the listing started, which is still ongoing. 

There is no precise date indicated for the conclusion of this process, which in theory could continue until September, but obviously the issuers are trying to accelerate the process as much as possible in order to go public as soon as possible. 

However, on the other side, there is the SEC that imposes technical times on which the issuers have no power. 

The hypothesis developed by Bloomberg’s ETF experts is that these two trends will converge around July 2nd, meaning that the timing for the actual stock market debut will be fast enough to be completed by early July, but on the other hand, it cannot be completed earlier due to the SEC’s technical timelines.

July 2nd is a Tuesday, and in theory, there would be time until Wednesday, July 3rd. However, on Thursday, July 4th, the US stock markets will be closed for the national Independence Day holiday. Monday, July 1st, on the other hand, seems to be too early a date. 

The landing on the stock exchange

When the spot Bitcoin ETFs actually landed on the stock exchange, on January 11th of this year, the price of BTC in the weeks (and months) prior rose significantly, while starting from the second part of the stock exchange session on January 11th it began to fall.

The rise was due precisely to the anticipation for the listing, while the fall was due to two simultaneous factors (the classic sell-the-news and the Grayscale liquidations) and lasted for about ten days. However, the previous rise had lasted more than two months. 

As for the price of ETH, nothing similar is happening at all. 

It is true that the day the news of the possible approval spread, the price suddenly rose from $3,000 to $3,700, and that the following week it had also risen above $3,900, but subsequently it fell. Currently, it hovers around $3,400, which is a level similar to that of early April. 

It should be added, however, that when the Bitcoin bull run started, driven by expectations for the stock market debut in January of spot BTC ETFs, the price of ETH was below $1,600, so in reality, a rally has already occurred on the price of Ethereum. However, ETH, unlike BTC, has not updated its all-time highs this year, and the current price is still far from the $4,100 annual highs.

Perhaps the markets fear a post-IPO decline of ETFs as happened for BTC, also because Grayscale’s Ethereum Trust could indeed liquidate many ETH after being converted into an ETF. And perhaps they also fear that spot ETFs on ETH may not achieve great success, unlike those on Bitcoin. 

The fact is that the rally due to the listing on the stock exchange of spot ETH ETFs did not happen, and at this point it also becomes difficult to imagine that there could be one of significant size from here to a week. 

The discussion, however, changes if we think in the medium or long term, because for example for BTC the three abundant weeks of decline post-ETF listing were then followed by a new rally that brought the price of Bitcoin to new all-time highs in just over a month. 

Therefore, if June and July might not be particularly positive periods for the price of Ethereum, from August onwards the situation could change.