Ethereum (ETH) price has encountered a setback after briefly surpassing the $3,500 mark on Monday, dropping once again to the $3,400 support level on Tuesday. The delay stems from the expected full approval by the SEC for Ethereum ETF applications, which have now been postponed to July 8.

SEC Requests Revised Filings

Analysts had initially anticipated approval by July 2, but the SEC has requested issuers to submit revised filings by July 8. Bloomberg ETF expert Erich Balchunas shared on social media that the SEC took additional time to provide feedback, resulting in a revised timeline. Balchunas stated: 

Unfort think we gonna have to push back our over/under till after holiday. Sounds like SEC took extra time to get back to ppl this wk (altho again very light tweaks) and from what I hear next wk is dead bc holiday = July 8th the process resumes and soon after that they’ll launch

Related Reading

SEC Chair Gary Gensler previously indicated that Ethereum ETFs would likely receive approval by “the end of the summer.” The SEC is currently reviewing and approving the S-1 forms, which represent the second step in launching spot Ethereum ETFs. 

Despite the delay, asset managers remain optimistic about the SEC greenlighting the first US spot Ethereum ETF applications that directly invest in Ether, with expectations set for mid-July. A recent Bloomberg report highlighted the constructive dialogue between asset managers and the regulator.

Ethereum ETF Launch Inches Closer

Per the report, the regulator’s feedback provided minor questions that issuers are currently addressing. In May, the SEC approved the proposal by exchanges to list these products, requiring a separate approval for their launch.

Steve Kurz, head of asset management at Galaxy Digital, predicted the approval of an Ethereum ETF within the next couple of weeks. Galaxy Digital has filed for an Ether ETF, and Kurz expressed confidence in the process, emphasizing their familiarity with the requirements based on their experience with the Bitcoin ETF.

Several prominent firms, including BlackRock Inc., Fidelity Investments, 21Shares, and Invesco, have filings awaiting approval. The disclosure of fees on the respective funds is a necessary step before trading commences.

Assuming the funds receive a green light, one key question remains: Will Ether portfolios generate a similar level of demand as the historic debut of US spot-Bitcoin ETFs in January, which accumulated $52 billion in assets?

 $15 Billion In Inflows Within First 18 Months

As previously reported by NewsBTC, Ethereum ETFs may attract significant inflows in the first few months of trading, although they may not have the same volume of inflows as the newly approved Bitcoin ETF market. 

In a note to investors Bitwise’s Chief Investment Officer (CIO), Matt Hougan projected that these ETFs could see $15 billion in net inflows within their first 18 months of trading. 

To arrive at this estimate, Hougan considered the market capitalizations of Bitcoin and Ethereum, expecting investors to allocate to their respective exchange-traded products (ETPs) proportionally.

Related Reading

Hougan pointed out that US investors have already invested $56 billion in Spot Bitcoin ETPs, and he anticipates this figure to reach $100 billion or more by the end of 2025. 

Drawing from this reference, he determined that Spot Ethereum ETFs would need to attract $35 billion in assets to match the Bitcoin ETFs, a process that could take around 18 months. 

Additionally, he noted that the Spot Ethereum ETFs would launch with $10 billion in assets, thanks to the conversion of the Grayscale Ethereum Trust (ETHE) into an ETF.

At the time of writing, ETH is trading at $3,418, recording significant losses in the monthly time frame amounting to over 9%. 

Featured image from DALL-E, chart from TradingView.com

Crypto investment products tracking Ethereum and others registered another week of outflows last week, albeit at a lesser amount, to extend the run of outflows to three consecutive weeks. Digital investment products witnessed $30 million worth of outflows last week.

However, this outflow deviated from the trend we normally observe, with Bitcoin taking a step back and most of the movement coming from Ethereum-based investment products. Particularly, the latest CoinShares report shows that institutional investors pulled a whopping $60.7 million from Ethereum-based investment products in just one week, the largest so far this year. 

Ethereum Leads The Outflows

CoinShares’ latest Digital Asset Fund Flows Weekly report suggests that institutional investor sentiment regarding Bitcoin is changing into a bullish one. Notably, Bitcoin-based products registered $10 million worth of inflows last week. While this is small compared to the normal level of inflows usually witnessed by the crypto asset, the fact that its inflow suggests a lingering bullish sentiment regarding Bitcoin despite a poor price performance last week.

On the other hand, the same can’t be said for Ethereum. Institutional investor sentiment regarding the king of altcoins seems to be waning as the launch of Spot Ethereum ETFs continues to drag on. Ethereum-based saw outflows of $61 million last week, the largest since August 2022.

Consequently, this means the asset has lost $119 million worth of institutional investment in the past two weeks, making it the worst-performing asset year-to-date in terms of net flows. This is backed up by data from CoinShares, which shows Ethereum’s year-to-date outflows now at $25 million. Furthermore, the data indicates Ethereum is the only digital asset with a net outflow since the beginning of the year.

Every other digital asset product registered inflows last week. Multi-asset products led the charge with $17.9 million worth of inflows. Bitcoin came in second with $10 million worth of inflows. Solana, Litecoin, XRP, and Chainlink also witnessed minor inflows of $1.6 million, $1.4 million, $0.3 million, and $0.6 million outflows, respectively. This influx of money suggests institutional investors are still willing to put money into altcoins despite the poor price performance of most of them last week. 

Reflecting the bullish sentiment, short-bitcoin products witnessed $4.2 million worth of outflows. Trading volumes also rose by 43% week-on-week to $6.2 billion but remained well below the $14.2 billion weekly average for the year. 

According to CoinShares, most providers saw minor inflows, although most of this was canceled out by $153 million in outflows from Grayscale. In terms of region, the US-dominated again with $43 million. Brazil and Australia followed with $7.6 million and $2.9 million inflows respectively. On the other hand, Germany, Hong Kong, Canada, Switzerland, and Sweden all witnessed outflows of $28.5 million, $23.2 million, $14.4 million, $13.3 million, and $4.3 million, respectively.

Featured image created with Dall.E, chart from Tradingview.com

An enormous surge is expected for the Ethereum network as the project’s co-founder and crypto enthusiast Vitalik Buterin has unveiled a new feature for the Ethereum blockchain that promises to speed up transaction confirmations times significantly. The new Single Slot Finality (SSF) feature has the potential to make Ethereum transactions very instantaneous, by streamlining the consensus-building process on the network.

Ethereum Network Transactions Sees Major Upgrade

With Ethereum continuing to develop, Vitalik Buterin‘s announcement emphasizes the continued efforts to address problems with efficiency and scalability. Single Slot Finality’s (SSF) debut is a critical step in improving the network’s ability to process more transactions swiftly and safely.​ 

Buterin revealed the latest innovative solution in a blog post titled “Epochs and slots all the way down: ways to give Ethereum users faster transaction confirmation times.”

Presently, Ethereum‘s Gasper consensus employs a slot and epoch architecture. With this system, a subset of validators can broadcast a vote on the head of the chain every 12 seconds, and all validators have 32 slots (6.4 minutes) to vote. After two epochs (12.8 min), these votes are reinterpreted as messages in a consensus mechanism that resembles PBFT and provides a solid economic guarantee known as finality.

Due to the existing approach’s drawn-out procedure, users have grown increasingly uneasy with it over the past few years. This is because the slot-by-slot voting method and the epoch-by-epoch finality mechanism are intricate and common with interaction flaws and 12.8 minutes is an excessively long time, as no one is interested in waiting that long.

However, with the introduction of the Single Slot Finality, all of this is about to change, as the SSF will supersede this approach with a process more akin to Tendermint consensus where block N is finalized prior to block N+1 being made. The primary distinction with Tendermint is that users can maintain the “inactivity leak” method, which keeps the chain alive and helps it recover in the event that over one-third of the validators go offline.

Although the new feature promises swift transaction time for the Ethereum network, there are also challenges it could face. Utilizing the initiative ignorantly will suggest that every Ethereum staker would have to post two messages every 12 seconds, potentially putting a huge burden on the chain.

Two Distinct Preconfirmations System

According to the blog post, the SSF feature boasts of two distinct approaches which include the Rollup preconfirmations and the Based preconfirmations. 

The Rollup confirmations generate a division of concerns within the Ethereum ecosystem. As a result, ETH layer 1 solutions will concentrate on being censorship-resistant, trustworthy, stable, and preserving and enhancing a specific fundamental core of functionality, while layer 2s will focus on engaging with users directly by making different technological and cultural compromises.

Meanwhile, the Based preconfirmations strategy assumes that ETH proposers would develop into highly skilled players for MEV-related purposes. By providing incentives for these knowledgeable proposers to take on the duty of offering preconfirmations-as-a-service, the approach capitalizes on this expertise.

Featured image from Adobe Stock, chart from Tradingview.com