The American crypto market is entering a phase of maturity, and this is clearly visible in the position of key players — Grayscale, a16z, and the Crypto Council for Innovation. In their appeals to the SEC, they insist on abandoning a unified approach to new exchange-traded products. This is not a bureaucratic whim but a systemic problem: the regulator is trying to stretch outdated frameworks over fundamentally new financial instruments.
The essence of the complaints boils down to the fact that each ETF on digital assets is unique in its structure, level of risk, and underlying collateral. Grouping them into a single category means ignoring the technical and legal nature of the asset. For example, a product based on staking carries entirely different operational risks than a fund based on classic bitcoin. Evaluating them by the same standards is a methodological error that could stifle innovation at its roots.
Key conflict: securities vs. commodity assets
Particular concern is raised by the automatic extension of the Investment Company Act rules to products where the underlying asset is not a security. This is a legal absurdity: if a token is classified as a commodity, applying norms for equity instruments creates dual regulation and unpredictable costs for issuers. The market is asking for clear differentiation, not blind copying of old templates.
Among the specific proposals is the introduction of predictable review timelines for applications and a mechanism for confidential pre-clearance. This would reduce uncertainty for issuers, who today are forced to wait years for a verdict without any guarantees even at the document submission stage. Transparency of the process is not a concession but a basic condition for attracting institutional capital.
My analysis: The SEC stands at a crossroads — either it recognizes that crypto ETFs require individual scrutiny, or it continues to slow down the market with universal bans. The second path has already shown its ineffectiveness: while the regulator hesitates, capital flows to offshore jurisdictions. Predictability and flexibility are the only way to maintain the competitiveness of the American financial system in the global race for digital assets.