BREAKING: Franklin Templeton’s XRP ETF Nears SEC Approval—Here’s Why It Matters

Wall Street's latest crypto play just got real. Franklin Templeton—the $1.5 trillion asset manager—just cleared a critical hurdle for its XRP exchange-traded fund (ETF). Cue the institutional money printers.

Why this changes everything:

- First-mover advantage: This would be the first XRP-focused ETF to hit US markets, beating BlackRock and Grayscale to the punch.

- Regulatory thaw: The SEC's sudden warmth toward Ripple's native token signals a seismic policy shift—or maybe just fatigue after losing 3 consecutive court battles.

Market impact:

XRP liquidity could double overnight as pension funds and boomer portfolios finally get 'safe' exposure. (Because nothing says 'conservative investment' like a token that mooned 600% in a week during the 2017 bubble.)

The bottom line: When traditional finance adopts crypto, they don't buy the dip—they buy the paperwork. And this ETF is their golden ticket.

Franklin Templeton’s XRPZ listed on DTCC post-S-1 filing amendment

Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart had reported on Tuesday that Franklin Templeton submitted an amended FORM S-1 registration statement for the XRP fund. The changes made include the shortened “8(a)” language, a legal “loophole” that allows the registration to automatically take effect after 20 days without a direct US Securities and Exchange (SEC) sign-off, unless the agency intervenes.

The updated prospectus sent to the regulator on Tuesday specifies that the Franklin XRP Trust will hold XRP tokens as its primary asset and will track the digital asset’s market performance. Once approved, the ETF is expected to list on the Cboe BZX Exchange.

Franklin Templeton’s filing is among several similar ETF submissions and proposed filing changes made in early November. Bitwise and Canary Capital filed amendments last week, removing the traditional “delaying amendment” clause to limit the SEC’s ability to control the timeline of approval.

Grayscale Investments also lodged its second amendment (Amendment No. 2) to its own XRP-related Form S-1 on Monday. 

Crypto In America podcast host and former FOX News correspondent Eleanor Terrett said Canary Capital could see its XRP ETF approved by November 13, pending final clearance from Nasdaq through its 8-A filing, and whether the government shutdown ends sooner. 

“The government reopening could affect the timing, potentially moving it up if the filing is complete and the SEC is satisfied, or back if staff propose additional comments,” she wrote on X in late October.

The strategy deployed by Franklin Templeton copies that of issuers behind Solana (SOL), Litecoin (LTC), and Hedera (HBAR) ETFs, which successfully launched under similar automatic-effect rules last month.

Just before the 38-day-long and counting US government shutdown began, these ETFs managed to clear the regulatory process and list without formal SEC approval delays. Bitwise’s BSOL ETF recorded an impressive $56 million in first-day trading volume, the highest debut among more than 850 ETFs launched to date.

Franklin Templeton ‘optimistic’ on digital asset market products

Franklin Templeton, the seven-decade-old financial firm that manages over $1.5 trillion in global assets, is among the most active traditional finance entities to launch crypto-based investment vehicles.

Earlier this year, it debuted spot EZBC (Bitcoin) and EZET (Ethereum) funds, which collectively attracted over $500 million in institutional capital within their first quarter. 

The New York-based company has also started a blockchain-based project in Hong Kong, launching the region’s first tokenized money-market fund together with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) under its new Fintech 2030 roadmap.

The Franklin OnChain US Government Money Fund is registered in Luxembourg and backed by short-term US Treasuries, using blockchain tokens in place of investor shares. Working with HSBC and OSL Group, one of Hong Kong’s 11 licensed virtual-asset platforms, Franklin Templeton is testing instant settlements through Project Ensemble, an HKMA sandbox for tokenized deposits. 

HSBC executives believe the tokenized platform could help bump fund flows and improve cross-system interoperability, which could later influence ETF operations in tokenized form. 

XRP ETF crosses $100 million in AUM after weeks of trading

Away from pending ETF approvals, the live REX-Osprey XRP ETF (XRPR), launched on September 18, surpassed $100 million in assets under management (AUM) within just five weeks, according to the issuer’s report in late October.

Outside US markets, the Hashdex Nasdaq XRP ETF (XRPH11), the world’s first spot XRP ETF, listed in Brazil, has accumulated approximately 7.17 billion Brazilian reais (around $1.33 billion) in total assets from over 300,000 investors, per statistics shared by the ETF provider’s website.

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