On September 30, Bitwise filed an application for an Exchange-Traded Fund (ETF) on Ripple (XRP) spot. At the moment, however, the price of the crypto XRP does not seem to reflect any particular enthusiasm from investors for the news. 

Bitwise and the application for a spot Ripple (XRP) ETF

The largest cryptocurrency index fund manager in the world, Bitwise, has filed an application for a spot Ripple (XRP) ETF. 

This deposit is visible on the official website of the Division of Corporations of the State of Delaware, with the date of incorporation on September 30.

In practice, Bitwise could begin its journey to succeed in the endeavor of issuing its new ETF on XRP spot, through this first step. And indeed, such a filing does not necessarily mean that the registration request with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of the USA is imminent. 

What Bitwise has just done is submit its registration of a trust entity. It is worth noting that companies like Bitwise, Blackrock, and Fidelity have all submitted trust entities for Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) before submitting the application for the ETFs following those tokens.

A spokesperson for Bitwise then confirmed that such a filing is legitimate thus affirming that the company is indeed moving towards its spot XRP ETF. 

This last part did not happen last November 2023, when a request for a presumed BlackRock XRP ETF also appeared on the website, triggering speculation on the price of the crypto. At that time, the asset management company BlackRock itself stepped in to categorically deny the rumors related to the launch of its ETF on XRP.

Bitwise and its filing of the spot Ripple (XRP) ETF in the USA

The move by Bitwise, to start its journey to issue its spot Ripple (XRP) ETF in the USA, is the consequence of the success of the two previous ETFs. 

And in fact, in this 2024, already in January the ETF on Bitcoin spot had been approved and, in July, the confirmation from the SEC for the ETF on Ethereum spot also arrived. 

Not only that, in August 2024, the crypto company Ripple managed to finally conclude the endless lawsuit against the SEC, officially declaring that XRP is not a security.

All these news have also led the CEO of Ripple, Brad Garlinghouse, to be positive about a future spot XRP ETF in the USA. In fact, Garlinghouse has stated that this XRP ETF is “inevitable”.  

With this scenario, Bitwise wanted to step in to try to accomplish this mission. At the moment, however, the news does not seem to have shaken XRP investors. 

The price of XRP

At the time of writing, XRP is worth $0.59, in a dump of -4% compared to 24 hours ago. In reality, the price drop of XRP started precisely on September 30, the date of the filing of the XRP ETF application by Bitwise. 

This means that this advance of the cryptocurrency index fund management company, is not receiving enthusiasm from XRP investors. 

On the contrary, from mid-September to the end of the month, XRP had recorded a price pump, probably as a consequence of the revelation of Grayscale wanting to soon launch its XRP Trust Fund.