First Mover Americas: Ether Surges on BlackRock’s ETF Plans

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BlackRock wants to create an ETF that holds Ethereum's ether (ETH), a plan that deepens the world's largest asset manager's commitment to cryptocurrencies. Following the news, the ETH price surged to the highest level of the day (Thursday), nearing $2,100 and up about 3% compared with just before the filing came out. It later gave back about half that gain, though it remains about 9% higher than 24 hours before. The company's plan was revealed in a filing by Nasdaq, the U.S. exchange where BlackRock will seek to list the product, which will need regulatory approval. Earlier on Thursday, it emerged that the corporate entity "iShares Ethereum Trust" had been registered in the state of Delaware; iShares is the name of BlackRock's ETF division.

Ether's (ETH) BlackRock (BLK)-prompted surge past $2,000 on Thursday stole the spotlight from bitcoin (BTC), which is down slightly on the day, at around $36,500, while ether is now around $2,100. According to David Lo, head of financial products at Bybit, ether could push further. “Historically, ETH often makes significant gains following a peak in Bitcoin's value, a pattern that may repeat here giving us a price target of around $2500,” said Lo. “After that, there may be a final rotation of profits into lower-cap coins before a cooling-off period, which may involve an overall 10-30% correction.”

Swiss bank UBS' wealthy clients can now take on exposure to three crypto exchange-traded funds (ETFs) through the lender's Hong Kong platform, according to a Bloomberg report citing a person familiar with the matter. The ETFs, Samsung Bitcoin Futures Active, CSOP Bitcoin Futures and CSOP Ether Futures ETFs, are all authorized by Hong Kong's securities regulator, the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC). Together, they boast assets worth around $72 million. Significantly, the news comes a day after HSBC, one of the world's largest banks, said it plans to start a digital assets custody service for institutional clients.

- Omkar Godbole