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On Tuesday, a panel of judges overturned a Securities and Exchange Commission decision to block Grayscale Investments from converting its bitcoin trust (OTC:GBTC) into a spot bitcoin (BTC-USD) exchange-traded fund. The court ruling sent token prices and crypto-linked stocks surging as the SEC is now required to revisit Grayscale’s application, which still could result in rejection.
“This is another big court win for Grayscale and the industry after the Ripple case, but it doesn’t appear that it will trigger a floodgate of spot Bitcoin ETF approvals in the near term,” Oppenheimer analyst Owen Lau wrote in a Wednesday note to clients.
As such, the probability of a U.S. spot bitcoin (BTC-USD) ETF approval has increased, “but our base case scenario is that the SEC won’t back off (similar to Ripple case) and this uncertain situation will drag on for a while,” he added. Nevertheless, the judges on Tuesday ruled that the SEC failed to explain its different treatment of similar products like BTC futures ETFs.
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