Digital asset manager Grayscale has confirmed its two spot Ether exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have officially started trading on the New York Stock Exchange, marking a “milestone” moment for its investors and the wider ETF market.
The launch comes one day after the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) signed off on the final approval for spot Ether (ETH) ETFs, allowing several issuers to launch their products for trading. In a July 22 X post, Bloomberg analyst James Seyffart said that the Grayscale Ethereum Trust (ETHE) had not yet received official effective documents from the SEC, but he expected it to come on the morning of trading commencing.
ETHE is currently the world’s largest Ether-based exchange-traded product, with $9.19 billion worth of ETH in its holdings. ETHE will charge investors a 2.5% management fee.
Grayscale’s second product, the Grayscale Ethereum Mini Trust (ETH), has waived fees for the first six months or until it reaches $2 billion in net assets under management.
Once either threshold is reached, a 0.15% fee will take effect, making it the cheapest spot Ether ETF offered in the US.
“ETH and ETHE will allow investors to invest in Ethereum’s potential to create markets, transform financial systems, utilize decentralized finance (DeFi), and drive innovation through the trusted ETP wrapper — without the need to buy, store, or manage Ethereum directly,” Grayscale’s managing director John Hoffman said in a statement sent to Cointelegraph.
Ether ETFs from BlackRock, Fidelity, 21Shares, Bitwise, Franklin Templeton, VanEck and Invesco Galaxy were also approved to begin trading on Tuesday, July 23.
Grayscale sends $1 billion worth of Ether to Coinbase after spot Ether ETF approval
On Monday, July 22, Grayscale transferred over $1 billion of ETH to Coinbase in preparation for the launch of its ETFs.
The 292,263 Ether transfer, worth a little over $1.01 billion, was the exact amount Grayscale said it would transfer from ETHE to its Ethereum Mini Trust in a July 18 filing.
Related: Spot Ethereum ETFs are coming, but ETH derivatives markets are flat
The move “should help alleviate some of the likely Grayscale outflows,” Seyffart said on Ju
Existing ETHE holders will receive the new Ether-backed product at a 1:1 ratio without triggering a capital gains tax event.
Seyffart and fellow Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas expect the spot Ether ETFs to muster somewhere between 10% to 20% of the flows that spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs have seen since those products launched a little over six months ago.
However, Bitwise’s chief investment officer, Matt Hougan, is confident that the spot Ether ETFs may have a bigger impact on Ether’s price than the spot Bitcoin ETFs have had on Bitcoin.
Hougan predicts Ether’s price will soar past its current all-time high to above $5,000 before the end of 2024.
Magazine: Bitcoin $500K prediction, spot Ether ETF ‘staking issue’— Thomas Fahrer, X Hall of Flame
