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ARTICLE · 16 JANUARY 2024

SEC Greenlights Bitcoin ETFs: What Happened And What It Portends

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On January 10, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved the launch of several BTC Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs).

United StatesTechnology
Patrick Daugherty
Patrick Daugherty
Peter Fetzer
Peter Fetzer
Natasha Dempsey
Natasha Dempsey
Jose A. Lazaro
Jose A. Lazaro
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On January 10, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved the launch of several BTC Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs).1 The approval order resolves the critical legal and regulatory issues entailed in launching a BTC ETF. Shares in trusts holding BTC can now be bought and sold on SEC-regulated exchanges, although other issues remain.

It may be that the SEC did this only because it was basically ordered to do so by three federal judges, and we note that its approval follows more than twenty disapprovals of other similar funds over the last six years.2 But for once we see forward-looking progress rather than "regulation by enforcement."

James Gorman, recently retired CEO and now Executive Chairman of Morgan Stanley, allows that Bitcoin has a role to play, albeit a "very small" one, in a rich person's portfolio.3 Meanwhile, Jamie Dimon, CEO and Chairman of JPMorgan Chase, has long held, to the contrary, that Bitcoin is "worthless."4 Between these

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