Over the past 10 years, Bitwise, Coinbase, Nasdaq, and TSE have all tried to create Crypto indices, but none have been very successful.

Now, the S&P Pantera Digital Asset Index (Ticker: SPPDA), launched by S&P DJI together with Pantera, is trying to change this logic: it does not include BTC, and instead focuses on selecting crypto networks that can generate protocol revenue and allow token holders to capture value.

SPPDA’s criteria for assets are: real usage scenarios, protocol revenue, and economic activity.

According to information released by S&P DJI, SPPDA’s initial basket includes 18 assets. The top five constituents confirmed so far include ETH, BNB, SOL, TRX, and HYPE, while the remaining 13 assets have not yet been fully disclosed. The official PDF also sets several asset screening principles, including:
◦ Newly eligible market cap must exceed $500 million
◦ Circulating supply ratio must be greater than 30%
◦ Trading activity/liquidity: LR must be above 0.5
◦ Must have a certain history of existence
◦ For two consecutive quarters, protocol revenue must be positive
◦ Exclude abandoned unowned tokens and meme coins

For S&P DJI as an issuer, everyone should be familiar with it: the well-known S&P 500 in the U.S. stock market (S&P 500 Index) and the Dow Jones Industrial Average are currently both maintained and operated by S&P DJI, so its influence is evident.

In fact, over the past 10 years, many institutions have launched crypto index products, but their presence in the market has already been very low. The common features of these indices are: 1) they generally include Bitcoin and with a high weight; 2) their overall performance largely tracks the Crypto bull-and-bear cycles—performing well in bull markets and falling so far in bear markets that you can hardly look; 3) they are highly exposed to BTC and ETH, and truly do not capture the value growth of different protocols in the Crypto ecosystem; 4) in the long run, returns are not better than simply holding BTC.

Addendum: historical Crypto index products
◦ The earliest was CRIX (Cryptocurrency Index) in 2016
◦ BITW (Bitwise 10 Crypto Index Fund) in 2017
◦ Coinbase Index Fund in 2018
◦ NCI (Nasdaq Crypto Index) in 2021
◦ CD20 (CoinDesk 20 Index) in 2021
◦ FTSE-Grayscale Digital Asset Index Series in 2024
◦ S&P Digital Markets 50 Index in 2025, including 15 tokens and 35 crypto-related stocks