ARK Investment Joins its Peers in Filing Registration Notice with SEC

Key Takeaways

• ARK Investment and 21Shares have submitted a registration notice to the SEC for a spot Bitcoin ETF.
• The recent ruling in favor of Grayscale suggests the SEC may be more open to approving  ETFs in the future.
• ARK 21Shares has proposed an annual management fee of 0.8% for its spot Bitcoin ETF.
• This is lower than the management fees of many other ETFs, which could make it more attractive to investors.

ARK Investment Management, led by Cathie Wood, in collaboration with Swiss crypto custodian 21Shares, has submitted a registration notice to the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF, an exchange-traded fund.

The company employed Form 8-A to register its shares as securities on the Cboe BZX Exchange on January 4.

More Bitcoin ETFs Seek Approval as SEC Deadline Looms

On the same day, the VanEck Bitcoin Trust and the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust also utilized Form 8-A to register their shares as securities on the Cboe BZX Exchange and New York Stock Exchange Arca, respectively. Just a day earlier, the Cboe BZX Exchange had approved the registration for listing Fidelity’s spot Bitcoin ETF.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has a deadline until January 10 to make a decision on whether to approve or reject the listing of shares of a Bitcoin ETF proposed by ARK Invest and 21Shares. Historically, the SEC has not approved any spot Bitcoin ETFs for listing on American exchanges, despite several applications being under consideration.

Notably, on January 26 last year, the SEC rejected a proposal to list the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF on Cboe BZX. The reason given for this rejection was the application’s failure to provide adequate safeguards “to prevent fraudulent and manipulative acts.”

Court Ruling and Management Fee Proposed

In August, US Court of Appeals Circuit Judge Neomi Rao granted Grayscale Investments’ request for a review of its application for a spot Bitcoin ETF. This decision also led to the vacating of the SEC’s order that had previously denied Grayscale’s GBTC listing application. This order instigated a regulatory reevaluation of all existing applications for spot Bitcoin ETFs.

If approved, ARK 21Shares has planned to set an annual management fee of 0.8% for its spot Bitcoin ETF. This fee would cover various operational expenses, including marketing and listing costs associated with the ETF.