Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs files for a DeFi Exchange-traded Fund (ETF) with the U.S. SEC

Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs has registered an application on July 26 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for an exchange-traded fund (ETF). This appeal provides worldwide exposure to public companies towards decentralized finance and blockchain.

The fund would invest at least 80% of its assets into securities, stocks, depositary receipts, and index included stock companies as per preliminary details.

According to the filing, "The Goldman Sachs Innovate DeFi and Blockchain Equity ETF (the 'Fund') seeks to provide investment results that closely correspond, before fees and expenses, to the performance of the Solactive Decentralized Finance and Blockchain Index (the 'Index').

Decentralized finance (DeFi) is one of the hottest emerging spaces in the crypto industry. The key features of DeFi like peer-to-peer lending, borrowing, and lending are changing the way traditional finance operates through a decentralized infrastructure. As per the data on DeFi Pulse, the total value locked (TVL) in DeFi has touched $65 billion.

Goldman Sachs is preparing to advance with the ETF "as soon as practicable after the effective date of the Registration Statement."

Recently VanEck and WisdomTree have filed for Ethereum ETFs. As of now, the US SEC is on its toes examining various ETF applications, which has resulted in slow verdicts on some of them. However, Goldman's filing appears to be the first decentralized finance-related ETF application.

In recent times Goldman has been increasing the scope of its cryptocurrency business. In a way to aid their clients, the company is restarting its crypto trading desk. This move comes as the cryptocurrencies continue to expand its presence in the financial markets.

Last month in June, the investment banking giant announced their plans to offer options and futures trading in Ethereum, Which is currently trading approximately at 1Ether = 2230 USD. It is also the second-largest cryptocurrency only after Bitcoin.

As per the filing, the shares are expected to be listed for trading "on a national securities exchange."

Earlier in May, the Wall Street giant started offering the trading for non-deliverable forwards (NDFs), derivative product tied to the price of Bitcoin. All settlements happen in cash and investors don’t deal with physical BTC in this case.

Back then, Max Minton, Goldman’s Asia-Pacific head of digital assets said: “Institutional demand continues to grow significantly in this space, and being able to work with partners like Cumberland will help us expand our capabilities. The new offering is “paving the way for us to evolve our nascent cash-settled crypto-currency capabilities.”