VanEck withdraws application for Lido staked Ether ETF
Key Takeaways
- •VanEck Digital Assets withdrew its SEC registration for the proposed stETH-based trust.
- •The filing did not provide a reason for the withdrawal or confirm plans for another product.
- •Any future version of the fund would require a new SEC filing.
- •The proposed vehicle would have held stETH and offered staking-linked Ether exposure through a conventional brokerage account.
Asset manager VanEck has withdrawn its proposal for an exchange-traded fund tied to Lido Staked Ether, shelving a product designed to give investors exposure to the liquid staking token.
In a filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Wednesday, VanEck Digital Assets said it "does not intend to proceed with the planned distribution" of the trust's shares. The filing did not explain what prompted the decision or whether VanEck would pursue a replacement product. Cointelegraph reached out to VanEck Digital Assets for comment.
A withdrawal request ends the SEC's registration process for a proposed fund, meaning any future version of the product would need to be filed anew with the regulator. For now, the brokerage-accessible route to staking-linked Ether exposure that the trust would have provided is not moving forward.
VanEck first filed the fund's S-1 registration statement — the form used to register securities with the SEC before they can be offered to the public — on Oct. 16, 2025. Under the proposal, the trust would have held Lido Staked Ether (stETH) and was expected to accrue certain staking rewards through its ownership of the token. The filing remains accessible through the SEC's EDGAR database.
stETH is the liquid staking token issued by Lido, the largest liquid staking protocol on Ethereum. Investors who stake Ether through the protocol receive stETH, a transferable token representing their staked ETH and accrued rewards. Because the token can be held, traded, or deployed in decentralized finance applications while the underlying Ether remains staked, a fund built on stETH would have offered investors staking-linked Ether exposure through a conventional brokerage account, without requiring direct interaction with the Lido protocol.
VanEck has been among the most active traditional managers in digital assets in the United States. The firm sponsors a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund that began trading in January 2024 and a spot Ether fund that launched in July 2024, following the SEC's approvals of the first US spot crypto ETFs.
Related: VanEck criticizes Metaplanet over executive dilution despite compensation cuts
Source: Cointelegraph
