On September 17, 2025, the SEC approved rule changes resulting in the creation of generic listing standards applicable to exchange traded products (ETPs) that hold spot commodities, including digital assets, seeking to list and trade their shares on the Nasdaq, Cboe BZX and NYSE Arca exchanges. The SEC’s approval order applies only to ETPs that are not registered investment companies. Adoption of the generic listing standards will reduce the time to bring commodity-based ETPs to market by replacing the previous requirement that the applicable exchange file a rule change proposal with the SEC pursuant to Rule 19b-4 under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 in order to list and trade each proposed commodity-based ETP on the exchange. The generic listing standards include requirements regarding the commodity-based ETP’s holdings, website disclosures, liquidity risk, initial and continued listing criteria, firewalls and other matters. An exchange will continue to be required to file a rule change proposal with the SEC when seeking to list and trade commodity-based ETPs that do not meet the generic listing standards.

Holdings. Each commodity held by an ETP, or a commodity that underlies a commodity-based asset held by an ETP, must meet at least one of the following criteria: (i) on an initial and continuing basis, the commodity trades on a market that is an Intermarket Surveillance Group (ISG) member, provided that the exchange may obtain information about trading in such commodity from the ISG member; (ii) on an initial and continuing basis, the commodity underlies a futures contract that has been made available to trade on a designated contract market (DCM) for at least six months, provided that the exchange has a comprehensive surveillance sharing agreement with such DCM; or (iii) on an initial basis only, an exchange-traded fund (ETF) designed to provide economic exposure of no less than 40% of its net asset value to the commodity lists and trades on a national securities exchange. Additional requirements apply with respect to an ETP’s holdings of equity securities, fixed income securities and listed options.

Website Disclosures. The commodity-based ETP must disclose on its publicly available website information regarding its holdings before the opening of regular trading; its net asset value (NAV), market price and premium/discount as of the end of the prior business day; tables and line graphs showing the ETP’s premiums/discounts over various time periods; median bid-ask spread information; its liquidity risk policies and procedures; its NAV calculation methodology; its prior day trading volume; and a downloadable prospectus.

Liquidity Risk. If a commodity-based ETP has, on a daily basis, less than 85% of its assets readily available to meet redemption requests, the ETP must have written liquidity risk policies and procedures reasonably designed to address the risk that it could not meet redemption requests without significant dilution of remaining shareholders’ interest.

Initial and Continued Listing Criteria. The generic listing standards for each exchange set forth a minimum required number of a commodity-based ETP’s shares that must be outstanding upon commencement of trading on the exchange, and the ETP must have a stated investment objective which must be adhered to under normal market conditions. The generic listing standards also set forth continued listing requirements and require ETP issuers to promptly notify the exchange of any noncompliance with those requirements. The exchange must maintain surveillance procedures for commodity-based ETP shares and consider the suspension of trading in and the delisting of ETP shares under certain circumstances.

Firewalls. The generic listing standards require exchanges to implement and maintain firewalls and policies and procedures designed to prevent the use and dissemination of material, non-public information and fraudulent or manipulative acts or practices.

The SEC’s approval order is available here, and a related press release is available here.