Digital asset manager Hashdex has taken another step in its proposal to offer a combined spot Bitcoin and Ether exchange-traded fund in the United States.
On June 24, the firm submitted an S-1 registration statement for its Hashdex Nasdaq Crypto Index US ETF, which will track certain cryptocurrency assets in the Nasdaq Crypto US Settlement Price Index — a daily closing value of the Nasdaq Crypto Index which measures the performance of a significant portion of the digital asset market.
The fund currently only seeks to include Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH), but the filing suggests that more assets could be added later.
“If any crypto asset other than bitcoin and ether becomes eligible for inclusion in the Index, the Sponsor will transition to a sample replication strategy, with only bitcoin and ether in the same proportions determined by the Index,” Hashdex wrote in its filing to the regulator.
In such an event, Hashdex would need to file another 19b-4 seeking approval to amend the cryptocurrencies held in the ETF, it noted.
The S-1 filing — which provides details of the security the issuer intends to offer — comes roughly five weeks after Hashdex filed its 19b-4 form on June 18, which the US securities regulator acknowledged in late June.
If both are approved, the combined cryptocurrency ETF would be allowed to list and trade officially, becoming the first of its kind in the US.
Hashdex’s ETF would be weighted according to the relative free float market caps of listed coins. If approved today, the weighting would be 76.3% Bitcoin and 23.7% Ether.
Litecoin (LTC), Chainlink (LINK), Uniswap (UNI) and Filecoin (FIL) are some of the cryptocurrencies also listed in the Nasdaq Crypto US Settlement Price Index, which Hashdex could seek to add to its ETF down the track.
Hashdex didn’t propose to include Ether staking in its combined spot cryptocurrency ETF.
BitGo and Coinbase Custody would serve as custodians for Hashdex’s BTC and ETH assets, placed in segregated accounts for individual shareholders.
Hashdex’s S-1 filing comes two days after eight asset managers launched their spot Ether ETFs on US stock exchanges.
Excluding outflows from the Grayscale Ethereum Trust, the spot Ether ETFs saw a combined $590.7 million in inflows on the first trading day — far more than industry analysts initially predicted.