SEC committee may delay decision on spot Bitcoin ETF

Jan 9, 2024 at 3:00 PM UTC

Edited by Brian Stone

News

Fox Business journalist Eleanor Terrett reported that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission may delay a decision on spot Bitcoin ETFs.

In the X post, she noted that the five-member U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) committee could still delay approval of a spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETF. While no formal ETF committee vote is scheduled, she explained that each committee member has the right to request a full committee review and vote on the matter based on their judgment.

An interesting caveat here on how the 5-member SEC Commission could potentially delay a $BTC Spot ETF approval.

While there’s no scheduled commission vote on the ETF, each commissioner apparently has the right to request a review and full commission vote (under the clause cited… https://t.co/W3pnOPXe2b
— Eleanor Terrett (@EleanorTerrett) January 8, 2024

“Commissioners include: Gensler (D), Crenshaw (D), Peirce (R), Lizárraga (D) and Uyeda (R).”
Eleanor Terrett, Fox Business journalist

In a comment to the post, senior ETF Analyst for Bloomberg Eric Balchunas stated that the current situation is an “accurate reading of regs,” but this does not worry him. The SEC staff works tirelessly with issuers, and he said that approving applications for spot Bitcoin ETFs is a plan that has no reason to be complicated.

I'm sure it's accurate reading of regs but I'm not worried about. Gensler directed all this. Staff working tirelessly w issuers. Approval is the plan. No reason to complicate it.
— Eric Balchunas (@EricBalchunas) January 9, 2024

Meanwhile, Bloomberg sources believe that the SEC will rule on several applications for spot Bitcoin ETFs on Jan. 10. Bloomberg also said the agency plans to vote on the exchanges’ filings (19b-4) “in the coming days.” Then, the regulator could decide on Form S-1 around the same time.

As the SEC’s decision awaits, the cryptocurrency community is divided into two sides. Some believe that the regulator will decide on applications within the specified time frame, while others expect the SEC to delay the approval of ETFs again. However, against market expectations, the BTC price expectedly went up, breaking through the $47,000 level and reaching multi-month highs.