THE United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) delayed on Thursday (Jan 25) its decision on an application by crypto asset manager Grayscale Investments to convert its Ethereum trust product into a spot exchange-traded fund (ETF).

The US markets regulator also on Wednesday delayed its decision on finance industry heavyweight BlackRock’s application to launch a similar product, exchange filings showed.

A spot crypto ETF tracks the market price of the underlying digital asset, giving investors exposure to the token without having to buy the currency.

Earlier this month, the SEC approved 11 spot bitcoin ETFs in a watershed moment for the crypto industry that had been demanding regulatory approval for such products for more than a decade.

Euphoria around the approval and heightened expectations of traditional finance intermingling with the crypto industry through the launch of the ETFs has led to broad gains in crypto tokens and associated industry stocks.

Bitcoin has rallied roughly 36 per cent over the last six months, while Ether, the second-biggest cryptocurrency by market capitalisation, has gained about 19 per cent. Ether was trading marginally down on Thursday. REUTERS

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