Investment manager VanEck plans to waive the fee on its proposed spot Ethereum exchange-traded fund (ETF) until 2025, or until the fund reaches $1.5 billion in assets under management (AUM), according to an amended S-1 filing on Friday.
“If the Trust’s assets exceed $1.5 billion prior to 2025, the sponsor fee charged on assets over $1.5 billion will be 0.20%,” read the filing.
“After 2025, the Sponsor Fee will be 0.20%.”
VanEck’s head of digital assets research Matthew Sigel told ETF.com that the move was geared towards “being a leader in crypto ETF fees” even if the firm loses money at the outset, with hopes that it would encourage investors to explore the role Ethereum can play in their investment portfolios.
In a post on X, Sigel clarified that “the plan is to make it up on volume; in this case, decentralized finance [DeFi] volume.”
When asked to elaborate on what he meant by DeFi volume, Sigel explained that more onchain activity translates into more ether gas spent, which in turn would push the price of ether higher, sending “VanEck ether bags up.”
Whether or not this move will drive more onchain activity remains to be seen. Still, VanEck seems to be moving forward with getting its spot Ethereum ETF ready to launch.
The firm filed a Form 8-A on Tuesday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which is one of the primary forms used to register securities before they are listed on an exchange.
The SEC approved eight spot ether ETF applications including VanEck’s earlier this year, and according to SEC chair Gary Gensler, the process of disclosures before their launch is “going smoothly.”
“It’s really about the asset managers making the full disclosure so that those registration statements can go effective,” said Gensler at a Bloomberg Invest Summit in New York on Tuesday.
