Spot Ethereum ETF is about to be approved for listing, and the prospects are exciting! According to industry executives and people familiar with the matter, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) may approve this milestone product before July 4, and the earliest approval time is July 2. Currently, negotiations between asset management companies and regulators have entered the final stage.

Meanwhile, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler recently said that the approval of the spot Ethereum ETF is progressing smoothly. He is confident that the ETF will be approved, although he did not give a specific timetable. He emphasized that the current focus is to ensure that asset management companies fully disclose the validity of their registration statements.

Ethereum hits another milestone! Network activity surges

Activity on the Ethereum network has reached an all-time high recently. The number of active crypto addresses surged 56% month-over-month in the week ending June 21. Interestingly, this high level of activity is still ongoing.

Over the weekend, Ethereum prices fluctuated in a narrow range between $3,400 and $3,550, which may reflect investors' expectations for upcoming regulatory developments. Increased network activity is often seen as a precursor to major events. The surge was mainly driven by investors' expectations that a spot Ethereum ETF will be approved soon. If this event comes true, it will be another important milestone in the crypto market and may significantly drive Ethereum prices up.

What is the future trend of Ethereum? Market opinions are divided

Brokerage and financial services company StoneX predicts that the price of Ethereum will rise by 40% within two months of the listing of the spot Ethereum ETF. In a longer time frame, StoneX's model predicts that the price of Ethereum will fluctuate between $2,142 and $12,621 in the next two years. The company mentioned that its most conservative forecast is based on the adoption of games and real-world assets (RWA), which many believe will promote total locked value (TVL) and adoption, but this growth may not be immediately apparent.

In addition, Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan said that the U.S. spot Ethereum ETF could attract $15 billion in net inflows in the first 18 months after listing. Matt Hougan compared Ethereum's relative market value with Bitcoin and expected investors to allocate according to the market value of Bitcoin spot ETF and Ethereum spot ETF ($1.2 trillion and $405 billion). This will provide a weight of about 75% for the Bitcoin spot ETF and about 25% for the Ethereum spot ETF.

However, Bloomberg analyst Eric Balchunas believes that after excluding hedging transactions and spot rotation, the actual net inflow of spot Bitcoin ETFs since its approval in January is $5 billion, while the flow of Ethereum may be only 10% of Bitcoin. This means that in the first six months after the approval of the spot Ethereum ETF, the actual net inflow may be $500 million, and the optimistic estimate is around $1.5 billion.

Eric Balchunas emphasized that Ethereum is not popular with traditional institutions such as pension funds, endowment funds, and sovereign wealth funds. The reason is that Ethereum's holdings in the institutional market are smaller than Bitcoin. In addition, Ethereum has risen 4 times from its low point before the launch of the ETF, while Bitcoin has only risen 2.75 times, showing that Ethereum's price has limited room for growth. Coupled with the poor performance of quantitative data, Ethereum is relatively unattractive among institutional investors.