BlackRock Makes Power Move: Files to Enable ETH Staking in Its ETFs—Crypto Just Got a Wall Street Stamp
Wall Street's trillion-dollar gorilla just swung into DeFi territory. BlackRock—yes, *that* BlackRock—officially filed to unlock staking rewards for its Ethereum ETF products. The institutional floodgates are creaking open.
Why this isn't your average crypto news
This isn't some scrappy crypto startup begging for legitimacy. When the world's largest asset manager pivots toward blockchain yield mechanics, it screams one thing: staking is now too lucrative for traditional finance to ignore. Even if they still pronounce 'DeFi' like it's a sandwich ingredient.
The fine print gambit
No details yet on whether BlackRock will run its own validators or outsource the work—but rest assured, they'll take their pound of flesh in fees. Because nothing warms a banker's heart like passive income wrapped in a 2% management wrapper.
Market makers are already salivating. ETH price action could get spicy if this greenlights a fresh wave of institutional demand. Just don't expect Larry Fink to start tweeting moon memes... yet.
The bottom line
With this filing, BlackRock isn't just dipping toes—it's doing a cannonball into crypto's deep end. TradFi meets trustless yield in what might be 2025's most consequential infrastructure play. Now we wait to see if the SEC blesses this marriage—or smashes the cake like a regulator-shaped wrecking ball.
Fight for ETH staking in ETFs that are far from over
With BlackRock submitting its 19b-4 filing, many in the crypto industry believe that staking for ETFs is now a done deal. This is not surprising given the firm’s record of only one refusal by the SEC for all its ETF applications and over 500 approvals.
However, experts believe that the fight is not over yet. Bloomberg analyst James Seyffart noted that there are several staking ETF filings before the SEC, and for earlier filings, the final deadline is late October. The final deadline for BlackRock’s filing is not until April 2026, but the analyst expects a decision from the regulator by Q4 of this year.
Seyffart said:
“Staking is not ‘done.’ There are plenty of ETH staking ETF filings already on the books. Final deadline for earlier filings is in late October. The Blackrock filing today won’t have a final deadline until ~April 2026 (but we think staking will likely be approved by at least 4Q25).”
Seyffart noted that the major challenge that staking ETF approval will face now is not from the SEC but rather from the Internal Revenue Service. However, he did not go further into how this could be a problem.
ETH doubles in value within 3 months thanks to ETFs and Institutional accumulation
Meanwhile, the timing of BlackRock’s filing coincides with ETH’s recent performance, which has seen the token wipe out all its losses for the year and finally have a positive year-to-date performance.
Over the past three months, ETH price has increased by 114%, a trend that is also evident within shorter periods, with a 38.5% gain in 30 days and 21.12% gains in seven days. The token is now trading at $3,420 and is up 2% year to date.
BlackRock filing likely contributed to its gains with the almost 4% rise in ETH value today in what looks like the start of the altcoin season, with ETH, XRP, SOL, and BNB seeing gains while Bitcoin recorded a slight drop.
However, the biggest contributor to ETH’s resurgence is likely the institutional interest evident in its ETFs’ inflows and ETH treasury companies’ accumulation. Data shared by Seyffart noted that ETH ETFs now have over $5.5 billion in inflows since launch, with $3.3 billion coming since mid-April.
While this is relatively small compared to the $18 billion in net flow for bitcoin ETFs in the last three months, it highlights the rising interest in spot ETH ETFs. That interest is likely to increase if staking is allowed for the product.
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