May. 03, 2022
To whom it may concern, The U.S. is falling behind other countries who have approved a spot bitcoin ETF by continuing to only allow inferior financial products such as futures-based bitcoin ETFs and closed-end fund bitcoin etfs that trade at premiums and discounts to NAV. This hurts Americans. Rightly or wrongly, because of such actions, Americans increasingly disbelieve the stated reason(s) for these continued rejections as cover stories and serve only to fuel the increasing belief by the American people that government institutions like the SEC do NOT exist to protect us, as it says, but engage in corrupt practices that benefit the connected at the expense of the unconnected. There is simply no reasons for the SEC to *not* allow this and continued delay in doing only serves the continued propagation of this idea. Bitcoin is here to stay, and Americans deserve exposure to this digital property however they see fit, whether it be by self-custodying bitcoin itself, a futures-based ETF, held in a 3rd party custodian, or held in a spot bitcoin ETF. If we as Americans really are capitalist, allow it and let the free market decide which product they want. The SEC's role is not to gatekeep access by picking winners and losers. Please do the right thing and allow the GBTC conversion to a spot bitcoin ETF. Regards, Edwin Day