Asset management giant Fidelity has filed a 19b-4 to launch a U.S.-regulated spot Ether exchange-traded fund (ETF), the Fidelity Ethereum Fund, which would be listed by an exchange owned by Cboe Global Markets.

Bitcoin-friendly Javier Milei has secured more than 55% of the votes in Argentina’s presidential elections, defeating his rival Sergio Massa with a margin of nearly 3 million votes.

Over the past day, Deribit's Bitcoin options open interest hit a record high, exceeding $15 billion and overtaking BTC futures for the first time in a shift that Deribit’s Chief Commercial Officer Luuk Strijers said “signifies the market’s maturation and growing sophistication.”

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

• Fidelity Files for Spot Ether ETF in the U.S.
• Pro-Bitcoin Javier Milei Wins Argentina’s Presidency
• Bitcoin Options Open Interest Reaches New All-Time High

Fidelity Files for Spot Ether ETF in the U.S.

Asset management giant Fidelity has filed a 19b-4 to launch a U.S.-regulated spot Ether exchange-traded fund (ETF), the Fidelity Ethereum Fund, which would be listed by an exchange owned by Cboe Global Markets.

The ETF, along with other similar spot crypto ETFs, including a spot Ether ETF filed by BlackRock, will need approval from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Both Fidelity and BlackRock are among the firms that filed to list spot Bitcoin ETFs in the U.S., but the SEC has yet to weigh in on these filings.

Some crypto enthusiasts believe that crypto ETFs, could have a significant impact on the crypto market. Crypto ETFs are more accessible than crypto itself as investors can buy them with a regular brokerage account, just like any other ETFs that follow various other assets, without having to manage their own private keys.

Fidelity’s ETF would use a pricing mechanism similar to the CME Ether futures and rely on price feeds from major spot exchanges. Fidelity suggests this would meet the SEC’s requirement of having surveillance-sharing agreements with a regulated market of significant size.

The filing refers to recent court rulings that state the CME futures market satisfies this criterion for spot bitcoin ETFs and noted that the “only remaining issue to be addressed is whether the ETH Futures market constitutes a market of significant size.“

The fund would directly hold ETH in cold storage and would allow authorized participants to exchange Ether for share creations and redemptions.

Pro-Bitcoin Javier Milei Wins Argentina’s Presidency

Bitcoin-friendly Javier Milei has secured more than 55% of the votes in Argentina’s presidential elections, defeating his rival Sergio Massa with a margin of nearly 3 million votes.

Massa, who served as the minister of economy, conceded defeat and congratulated Milei on his win after more than 90% of the votes were tallied — even before the official results were announced.

Milei will assume office on December 10 and is known for being a critic of the country’s central bank, calling it a scam and a “mechanism by which politicians cheat the good people with inflationary tax.”

Argentina has been dealing with persistent inflation for years, registering a growth of 140% in the past 12 months. To Milei, Bitcoin is a movement toward “the return of money to its original creator, the private sector.”

Bitcoin Options Open Interest Reaches New All-Time High

Over the past day, Deribit's Bitcoin options open interest hit a record high, exceeding $15 billion and overtaking BTC futures for the first time in a shift that Deribit’s Chief Commercial Officer Luuk Strijers said “signifies the market’s maturation and growing sophistication.”

Deribit dominates the bitcoin options market with an 85% share and as Bitcoin option open interest on it surpassed $15 billion, total Bitcoin open interest on these products across cryptocurrency exchanges reached a new high of $16.49 billion.

Strijers remarked that the surge in open interest reflects the growing intricacy of the cryptocurrency market, emphasizing options trading's popularity for strategies like hedging and leveraging volatility.

Open interest is the total number of outstanding contracts that have not yet been settled. An increase in it suggests an increase in sophisticated trader activity.

State of the Crypto by Top Tier Exchange Volume

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