In an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph, John Lo, the founder of Recharge Capital, expressed uncertainty about the approval of a spot Ether exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the United States. He believes that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) will subject all upcoming crypto-based ETFs, particularly Ether ETFs, to closer scrutiny.
Several companies, including BlackRock, Grayscale, Fidelity, Invesco Galaxy, VanEck, Hashdex, and Franklin Templeton, are competing for an Ether ETF. The SEC has specific decision deadlines for each application, with VanEck’s application due on May 23, ARK 21Shares’ on May 24, Hashdex’s on May 30, Grayscale’s on June 18, and Invesco’s on July 5. Fidelity and BlackRock’s applications must be decided by August 3 and August 7, respectively.
However, Lo believes that even if the SEC denies the applications, Ethereum will continue to thrive without an Ether ETF due to its rapid innovation and recent network upgrades.
Lo also discussed the challenges faced by decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. He highlighted the lack of focus on user experience, making it difficult for crypto beginners to use these platforms. Additionally, the high cost of user acquisition is limiting the number of DeFi users and hindering institutional participation.
Despite these challenges, Ethereum remains a hub for DeFi activity. According to DefiLlama, the total value locked (TVL) on the Ethereum network has increased by 80.3% over the past year, reaching $51 billion as of March 18. Furthermore, Etherscan data shows that the number of unique wallet addresses has grown by 21.6% to 115,934 during the same period.
In related news, an unnamed presale address managed to accumulate $33 million worth of SOL tokens within just one hour.