US SEC approves bitcoin ETFs in watershed for crypto market

investing.com:

By Hannah Lang and Suzanne McGee

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) -The U.S. securities regulator on Wednesday approved the first U.S.-listed exchange traded funds (ETFs) to track bitcoin, its Chair Gary Gensler said, in a watershed for the world's largest cryptocurrency and the broader crypto industry.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approved 11 applications, including from BlackRock (NYSE:BLK), Ark Investments, 21Shares, Fidelity, Invesco and VanEck, among others, according to a notice on its website. Some products are expected to begin trading as early as Thursday.

The products — a decade in the making — are a game-changer for bitcoin, offering institutional and retail investors exposure to the world's largest cryptocurrency without directly holding it, and a major boost for a crypto industry beset by a string of scandals.

Standard Chartered (OTC:SCBFF) analysts this week said the ETFs could draw $50 billion to $100 billion this year alone, potentially driving the price of bitcoin as high as $100,000. Other analysts have said inflows will be closer to $55 billion over five years.

«It's a huge positive for the institutionalization of bitcoin as an asset class,» said Andrew Bond, managing director and senior fintech analyst at Rosenblatt Securities. «The ETF approval will further legitimize bitcoin.»

Bitcoin was last up 2.13% at $46,924. Some analysts had noted that the market may have already priced in the news of approval — bitcoin had soared more than 70% in recent months on growing anticipation of an ETF, and hit its highest level since March 2022 earlier in the week.

A green light marks a U-turn for the SEC, which for a decade rejected bitcoin ETFs due to worries they could be easily manipulated. SEC