The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has paused new crypto ETF reviews after the federal fiscal year began on October 1, 2026, without a budget, according to HOGE Wire. According to ChainCatcher, registration statements cannot be declared effective and staff no longer issue comment letters during the funding lapse.

Existing listed products are not affected, and BlackRock's IBIT, Fidelity's FBTC, and Grayscale-related products can still trade and continue subscriptions and redemptions. New crypto ETFs must complete both an exchange-filed 19b-4 and an issuer-filed S-1 or N-1A, and both paths are suspended during the lapse.

On September 17, 2025, the SEC approved generic listing standards for commodity-based trust shares, allowing qualifying products to skip individual 19b-4 filings and cutting review time from as long as about 240 days to about 75 days. Leveraged, inverse, actively managed, lending, and staking products are not covered by that framework.

The article said more than 90 applications were pending at the start of October, with some deadlines due early in the month. Nate Geraci told Decrypt that the ETF Cryptober expected by the industry may be delayed for now, describing the situation as a postponement rather than a rejection.

The article also said that on March 17, 2026, the SEC and the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission jointly said protocol staking does not constitute the offer or sale of securities. BlackRock's Ethereum product ETHB is listed on Nasdaq with a 0.25% fee and allocates 82% of staking rewards to investors.