On Thursday, June 13th, Gary Gensler, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), revealed during a budget hearing that the final approval process of the highly anticipated Ethereum Ether (ETH) exchange-traded fund (ETF) is expected to be completed this summer. Chairman Gensler stated that the entire process is progressing smoothly after the initial approval of the first batch of ETFs and that the final registration documents for these funds, the S-1, are currently being actively processed by SEC staff.

Once these documents are approved, the new Ethereum ETFs will be able to be traded on the market, offering investors a new and easy-to-trade financial product that will allow them to participate in the market by holding actual ether, similar to the previous Bitcoin spot ETFs. Despite the SEC having previously prevented the launch of Bitcoin ETFs, a recent ruling by a federal court found that the SEC had mishandled the issue, prompting Chairman Gensler to state that the SEC will comply with the court's decision and allow these products to be listed.

The announcement had a relatively calm impact on the price of ether.

It is worth noting that JPMorgan is skeptical of the further approval of cryptocurrency ETFs beyond ether. JPMorgan strategist Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou pointed out that the US Securities and Exchange Commission views most cryptocurrencies as securities, which raises questions about further approval of crypto ETFs. Panigirtzoglou said, "Given that it is not clear whether Ethereum should be classified as a security, the SEC's approval of an ETH ETF is somewhat excessive. We do not believe that the SEC will further approve Solana or other token ETFs because the SEC holds a stronger view (compared to Ethereum) that tokens other than Bitcoin and Ethereum should be classified as securities."

During the hearing, Chairman Gensler did not give a clear answer when questioned about whether ETH is a commodity, maintaining the SEC's consistent ambiguous stance on the issue. Meanwhile, Rostin Behnam, Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), stated unequivocally that ETH is a commodity when asked the same question. This issue is critical in determining the corresponding US regulatory agencies for different tokens, as the SEC will regulate security tokens while the CFTC will regulate other tokens.

Furthermore, Chairman Gensler emphasized several times that most digital assets should be considered securities, although he refused to specify which tokens belong to the securities category, except those explicitly listed by the SEC during enforcement actions. He pointed out that those cryptographic securities have an obligation to disclose information to the public, and not all cryptocurrencies are cryptographic securities, some of which fall under Chairman Behnam's regulatory purview.

Regarding regulatory capabilities, Chairman Gensler criticized the industry's "contempt" for SEC rules and pointed out that, unlike the CFTC, the SEC is responsible for supervising information disclosure, so the CFTC does not currently have the complete regulatory power to regulate disclosure-based regulatory systems. He mentioned that if Congress does indeed give the CFTC more responsibility for regulating cryptocurrency trading, the CFTC still lacks some necessary powers to regulate the cryptocurrency market. He emphasized that the CFTC lacks the traditional regulatory tools that make the US capital and derivatives markets strong, such as registration, custody, monitoring, and supervision, and that the CFTC needs a larger budget to strengthen these capabilities.

In terms of market predictions, both Chairman Gensler and Chairman Behnam are opposed to contracts that predict election results. Their agencies have recently taken action to block such contracts. Chairman Behnam stated clearly that they are taking measures to ensure that such contracts are banned because "we don't need to commodify elections right now," and emphasized that such behavior "clearly violates existing laws."

Regarding the prediction market, both Chairman Gensler and Chairman Behnam are opposed to contracts that predict election results. Their institutions have recently taken action to prevent such contracts. Chairman Behnam explicitly stated that they are taking measures to ensure that such contracts are banned because "we do not need to commoditize elections" and emphasized that such behavior "obviously violates current laws".

Editor/Somer