BlackRock Rules Out Solana (SOL) ETF Launch Anytime Soon, Leaving Room for Other Asset Managers to Compete

The company's dismissal of small-cap altcoins leaves room for other asset managers to compete in this area, with some already filing to launch the product.

BlackRock has no plans to launch a Solana (SOL) exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the “near term,” the company’s CIO said Tuesday.

Samara Cohen’s comments came during an interview with Bloomberg, where she was asked about the possibility of a BlackRock Solana ETF.

“We really look at the investability – what meets the criteria, what meets the bar to be delivered in an ETF,” Cohen said. “In terms of investability and client demand, I think Bitcoin and Ethereum certainly meet that bar.”

“I think it will be a while before we see anything else,” she added.

BlackRock launched two crypto ETFs this year, both of which have seen strong demand. The iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) has gathered nearly $20 billion in inflows since its launch on January 11 and had the best opening 30 days of any ETF in history.

Meanwhile, BlackRock’s Ethereum ETF, which launched in March, now holds $440 million in ETH, according to on-chain data.

However, the case for launching a Solana ETF is less clear-cut. At Bitcoin 2024 last week, Robert Mitchnick, BlackRock’s head of digital assets, said that “the next plausible investible asset is at, like, 3%” of crypto’s total market cap.

“It’s just not close to being at that threshold or track record of maturity, liquidity, et cetera,” he added.

Mitchnick also highlighted in March that Bitcoin was still the “overwhelming top priority” among BlackRock’s crypto-focused clients. “Then a little bit of Ethereum, and very little everything else,” he said.

Can a Solana ETF really happen?

VanEck was the first firm to file for a Solana spot ETF in the U.S. in late June. The company argued that there was little reason for regulators toمنع them from allowing SOL to trade publicly, given that it functions in much the same way as BTC and ETH, which had already been greenlit.

“Like Ether on the Ethereum network, SOL can be traded on digital asset platforms or used in peer-to-peer transactions,” said Matthew Sigel, VanEck's head of digital asset research, at the time.

Unlike BTC and ETH, however, Solana does not yet have a futures market on the CME, which was a cornerstone of the legal arguments that got Bitcoin spot ETFs approved. It’s also unclear whether the SEC would deem SOL to be a security token, as the agency did in its lawsuit against Coinbase.

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