blockmanity.com
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has once again postponed the decision of the VanEck-SolidX Bitcoin Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) approval.
The decision has been pushed to February 27th next year, the SEC will have to take a decision in February and cannot postpone it any further.
The SEC said in a statement:
“The Commission finds it appropriate to designate a longer period within which to issue an order approving or disapproving the proposed rule change so that it has sufficient time to consider this proposed rule change,”
The SEC has previously rejected many Bitcoin ETFs by Winklevoss, Proshares, Direxion, and others. The SEC commissioner Hester Pierce who is also called the “Bitcoin Mom” as she is pro Bitcoin ETF advised investors not to wait for the ETF approval as it could take days to years.
The director of VanEck Gabor Gurbacs spoke to Cheddar after the decision came out, he showed optimism about the ETF approval and suggested that America wants a Bitcoin ETF.
He said:
“We think that we’ve met all market structure obstacles and requirements on pricing, custody, valuation, and safekeeping, so we are cautiously optimistic.”
Brad Smith Tweeted:
VanEck talks $BTC ETF pending SEC approval on @Cheddar #CryptoCraze 👉🏾 Last day that the ETF can be approved is by the end of February pic.twitter.com/lJFRz9sOjf
— Brad Smith (@thebradsmith) December 6, 2018
One of the main concerns of the SEC is price discovery and market manipulation. VanEck is actively working with the top OTC desks and Nasdaq in Crypto to create a reliable source for price discovery.
Blockmanity’s Take
The delay in the Bitcoin ETF approval was quite anticipated by many industry participants. The main concern the SEC has is that of market manipulation. Unless this is clear the commission will not approve the ETF anytime soon.
But on the bright side, there is infrastructure being built for institutions to dip their feet in Crypto. Nasdaq, the second largest exchange in the world confirmed the launch of their Bitcoin futures product next year. NYSE backed Bakkt is set to launch in January next year.