One month ago, Standard Chartered predicted that with ETF approval in the rearview mirror, bitcoin would eventually rise up to $200,000. It has since turned its attention to ether and the inevitable ethereum ETF approval, and while it does not follow up with a similarly bombastic forecast, it nonetheless sees ETH rising to $4,000 by May 23, when it expect the Ethereum ETH will be approved. Incidentally, we agree.

How do they get there? Well, as Std Chtd analyst Geoff Kendrick writes, the SEC approved 11 new spot Bitcoin ETFs on 10 January. The approvals, along with BTC price action before and since, provide valuable lessons for the ongoing Ethereum (ETH) ETF application process.
According to Kendrick, the SEC’s dominant strategy for ETH ETF applications is to replicate the BTC process. This partly reflects structural similarities between the two. During its case against Ripple in June 2023, the SEC did not list ETH (or BTC) among the 67 coins and tokens that it claimed were “securities". In addition, ETH - like BTC - is a listed and regulated futures contract on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME).

As a result, the bank expects pending applications for ETH US spot ETFs to be approved on 23 May, the final deadline for the first of the ETFs under consideration - the equivalent date to 10 January for BTC ETFs. And if ETH prices perform similarly to how BTC prices performed in the lead-up to BTC ETF approval, Kendrick expects ETH to trade as high as $4,000 by then.