The VanEck Solid Bitcoin Trust decided to withdraw its Bitcoin ETF proposal filed earlier this year on January 30, 2019. The withdrawal comes just a month before SEC’s final deadline of the verdict.
The Chicago Board Options Exchange’s (CBOE) BZX Exchange has withdrawn the proposed rule change in the Bitcoin ETF proposal issued by the VanEck/SolidX Bitcoin Trust. The SEC notice on Tuesday, September 17 states that CBOE decided to withdraw its proposal last week on September 13.
The VanEck SolidX Trust filed for the Bitcoin exchange-traded-fund (ETF) with the SEC earlier this year on January 30. Nearly after a month on February 20, 2019, the Federal Register published the filing.
Over the last few months, the SEC has delayed its decision several times on giving its verdict on this matter. Moreover, October 18 next month was the final deadline for the U.S. SEC to either approve or reject the Bitcoin ETF proposal. But it seems that looking to the cold response from the SEC, all the involved parties thought of withdrawing it for now.
In a tweet, Gabor Gurbacs, VanEck’s director of digital asset strategies, said that his company is still committed towards “Bitcoin-focused financial innovation”. In the future, they will continue to meet with the regulators and work out some methods to bring the crypto ETFs.
We are committed to support Bitcoin and Bitcoin-focused financial innovation. Bringing to market a physical, liquid and insured ETF remains a top priority. We continue to work closely with regulators & market participants to get one step closer every day. https://t.co/bDYiSbTRVl
— Gabor Gurbacs (@gaborgurbacs) September 17, 2019
On the other hand, crypto industry expert Jake Chervinsky said that it is difficult to expect Bitcoin ETF arrival in 2019.
VanEck withdrew its bitcoin ETF proposal today, presumably expecting that the SEC would reject it next month. Bitwise’s proposal is still pending (for now) & due for a final decision on October 13. My best guess — there will be no bitcoin ETF in 2019. 🙁https://t.co/cMamYkymk1
— Jake Chervinsky (@jchervinsky) September 17, 2019
VanEck’s Failed Attempt of Launching Limited Bitcoin ETF
Earlier this month, VanEck launched a limited Bitcoin ETF only for qualified institutional buyers. Several industry experts criticized VanEck of playing out this marketing gimmick saying that it was no-where close to a real ETF.
However, the VanEck Limited Bitcoin ETF failed to impress investors seeing almost zero demand for its product. In three days after its launch, the ETF could garner a buy order of only one basket of 4 BTC tokens valued at just $40,000. This is a very low figure for any institutional product in the market.
The SEC regulator has yet not been convinced that the crypto market has enough robust tools in place to counter bad actors from influencing crypto prices or prevent market manipulation. Recently during an interview with the CNBC, SEC Chairman Jay Clayton said that although there’s some progress ahead with the Bitcoin ETF, there is still a lot of pending work to be done before getting the product in the market.
Speaking to CoinDesk earlier this month, VanEck head of ETF product Ed Lopez said:
“We still strongly believe the marketplace and many investors would be better served to have a regulated product out there and this is just one small step towards that and right now it happens to be only available to institutions.”
