SEC approves Bitwise’s spot Chainlink ETF for listing on NYSE Arca

The US SEC has approved Bitwise Asset Management’s application to list a spot Chainlink exchange-traded fund on NYSE Arca, which could become the second LINK ETF to trade in the US after Grayscale’s product debuted on the exchange on December 2.

The approval will see Bitwise proceed to launch the product under the ticker CLNK, allowing investors to gain direct exposure to Chainlink without holding the digital token themselves, and is expected to begin trading as early as this week, according to filings published on the SEC’s website.

Bitwise file second amendment for LINK ETF

The approval follows Bitwise’s Form 8-A and S-1 amendment number 2 filings with the SEC, a required step for securities intended to trade on national exchanges. The firm submitted both statements on Monday under the Securities Act of 1933, updating disclosures of the structure and operation of the trust.

Bitwise Form 8-A filing. Source: SEC.gov

According to the S-1 amendment prospectus, the trust will charge a unitary management fee of 0.34% per year, calculated based on the value of the trust’s Chainlink holdings. For the first three months after listing, Bitwise has agreed to waive the entire sponsor fee on the first $500 million in trust assets.

Shares of the ETF will be created and redeemed in blocks of 10,000 shares, referred to as a basket. Each basket will correspond to a specific quantity of LINK attributable to each share, adjusted for accrued but unpaid expenses and liabilities. 

Bitwise has appointed Coinbase as the custodian for the trust, responsible for safeguarding the assets and segregated accounts holding LINK. The prospectus also mentioned that staking was not included at the time of its application. However, Bitwise intends to amend the registration statement at a later date to permit staking as a secondary investment objective. 

“The amended registration statement will include a detailed description of the Trust’s staking program under a section entitled “STAKING.” In connection with this secondary investment objective of seeking to derive additional Chainlink through staking, the Trust will stake some or all of the Chainlink held in the Trust Chainlink Accounts,” the amendment filing read.

Bitwise to add Chainlink in list of ETP products

Bitwise witnessed an event-packed 2025 with several ETF filings slated to be approved or turned down by the SEC this year. Just before last year’s end, the financial institution submitted applications for 11 crypto exchange-traded funds with the SEC through an N-1A filing.

The San Francisco-based asset manager is seeking approval for a “strategy” ETFs meant to make both direct and indirect investments in Aave, Canton, Ethena, Hyperliquid, NEAR, Starknet, Sui, Bittensor, Tron, Uniswap, and Zcash. Each of these funds would invest up to 60% of its assets directly in a token, with the rest allocated to one or more exchange-traded products that provide exposure to the same asset.

In October, Bitwise became the first issuer to launch a spot Solana ETF in the United States, and followed that debut by launching XRP and Dogecoin ETFs the next month. More recently, Bitwise filed an S-1 registration statement for a spot Sui ETF and submitted an amended filing for a Hyperliquid ETF.

Chainlink’s price initially showed strong upward movement on news of the ETF approval. The asset gained more than 9.8% over the past week to trade at $14.18 per Coingecko data. However, a price correction pulled the price back down 1.5% in the last 24 hours.

Chainlink’s daily trading volume went up by nearly 45%, while futures market data from Coinglass showed open interest climbing to around $665 million, which suggests more traders are opening new positions than closing short-term trades.

Some market watchers see the current chart setup as bearish, citing weak indicators and a pullback toward $13.2, or even down to $12.8. The two price levels present areas to watch for bearish confirmation, where the token could draw several rejection candles or failure swings to the upside.

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