BlackRock’s ETHB ETF: A Gilded Cage of Staking Rewards & 18% Siphon

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Key Highlights

  • The amended S-1, with the precision of a Swiss watchmaker, allocates 18% of gross staking consideration to the Sponsor’s Staking Portion and the Prime Execution Agent, leaving the trust to savor the crumbs of the remainder.
  • A 0.25% annual sponsor fee is disclosed, with a temporary 0.12% discount for the first $2.5B in assets-a charade of generosity for 12 months post-listing.
  • The prospectus, written in the language of bureaucratic poetry, declares the shares’ intended listing on Nasdaq under the ticker ETHB, where market prices may whimsically dance away from NAV.

BlackRock, that titan of asset management with the soul of a Victorian curator, has filed an amended registration statement for its iShares Staked Ethereum Trust ETF. The document, a labyrinth of legalese, now reveals how staking rewards will be divvied up-a process resembling a sardonic ballet of percentages.

How the 18% “Staking Fee” Works

The filing, with all the subtlety of a tax audit, states that the trust will pay 18% of “gross Staking Consideration” as a “Staking Fee.” The remaining crumbs, it seems, are to be retained by the trust, which may or may not thank the gods of finance for this meager offering.

This 18%, a figure as elegant as a tax bill, is split between the Sponsor’s Staking Portion and the Prime Execution Agent. The latter may then pass some of this bounty to staking service providers, a chain of generosity that feels less like alchemy and more like a Ponzi scheme dressed in pinstripes.

Sponsor Fee: A Separate Dance of Greed

The sponsor fee, a daily accrual of 0.25% of NAV, is described with the solemnity of a eulogy. Yet, it is not immune to the occasional act of mercy-a 12-month waiver reducing it to 0.12% for the first $2.5B in assets. One might call it a discount, though “discount” here is a term applied to a thief who lowers his rates for the first hour.

This fee, distinct from the staking fee, is expressed as an annualized percentage of NAV, a metric as useful as a weather vane in a hurricane when compared to the staking fee’s blunt percentage of rewards.

Custody and Staking: A Symphony of Numbers

The filing, in a nod to the theater of finance, names Coinbase Custody Trust Company as custodian and Coinbase, Inc. as the prime execution agent. Staking, it says, will occur through “approved validator schedules,” a phrase that evokes the charm of a bureaucratic poem. This arrangement, the document insists, is a “gilded cage” of documented workflows, designed to appease investors while they sip their lattes and ponder the void.

The prospectus, with all the gravitas of a funeral oration, declares the shares’ intended listing on Nasdaq under ETHB. It also notes that market prices may differ from NAV-a truth so obvious it could only be stated by someone paid to say it.

The S-1 amendment, filed “subject to completion,” is a disclosure step, not a victory lap. Yet it reveals, with the clarity of a confession overheard in a crowded café, the exact manner in which staking consideration will be siphoned between the trust and those with greasy hands.

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2026-02-17 20:30