Jan van Eck, CEO of the investment firm VanEck, doubts that his firm's spot Ethereum (ETH) exchange-traded fund (ETF) will be approved in the upcoming month.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is set to deliver a decision on May 23.
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This skepticism is based on the fact that the SEC has been inactive on the seven pending applications for spot Ether ETFs, which is the opposite of what happened with spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs before they were approved.
In an interview with CNBC, van Eck stated:
<VanEck and ARK Invest> are the first in line for May to probably be rejected. The way the legal process goes is that regulators will give you comments on your application, and that happened for weeks and weeks before the Bitcoin ETFs, but right now pins are dropping as far as Ethereum is concerned.
Bloomberg Intelligence ETF analyst James Seyffart has also recently questioned the May approval, citing that the SEC hasn't engaged with issuers. Similarly, his colleague Eric Balchunas has revised his odds of approval by May from 70% to 35%.
As the deadline approaches, the SEC's lack of conversation hints at a cautious stance, dampening the hopes of issuers.
Despite the uncertainty surrounding Ethereum ETFs, the market for Bitcoin ETFs has seen positive momentum. VanEck's spot Bitcoin ETF, trading under the ticker HODL, has attracted an inflow of $461.7 million since its inception in mid-January, according to Farside data.
The situation of spot Bitcoin ETFs seems promising worldwide, with the recent news of Hong Kong being set to announce the first batch of approved spot Bitcoin ETFs by April 15.
