ARK Invest and 21 Shares cut staking component from latest spot Ethereum ETF filing

A spot ether exchange-traded fund proposal from Cathie Wood's ARK Invest and 21Shares will not include staking. 

In a previous filing , ArkInvest/21 Shares included a staking component that said that the "sponsor may, from time to time, stake a portion of the Trust’s assets through one or more trusted Staking Providers." That specific language was not included in the updated filing on Friday. 

The updated filing removing staking could mean a few things, said Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas in a post on X on Friday. 

"While it may seem like this is them getting their docs in shape based on SEC comments (which would be good news) there hasn’t been any comments," Balchunas said. "So its prob either a Hail Mary or maybe trying to give SEC one less thing to use in their rejection. Not sure (yet)." 

ARK Invest and 21 Shares did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Ark Invest and 21Shares applied for the spot ether ETF in September and said the fund would provide direct exposure to ether and trade on the Cboe BZX Exchange using the CME CF Ether-Dollar Reference Rate – New York Variant. 

21Shares is the sponsor of the trust, Delaware Trust Company is the trustee, and Coinbase Custody Trust Company is the ether custodian. ARK Investment Management is the sub-adviser of the trust and will provide assistance in the marketing of the Shares.

Optimism for the SEC's approval of spot ether ETFs has dwindled over the past few months. Last month, Balchunas lowered his estimate of the chances of a spot Ethereum ETH -3.85% ETF approval by late May from about 70% to 25%.