Why XRP Holders Are Watching This SEC Proposal Closely

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed a rule change yesterday that would make it much easier to list crypto investment products that hold XRP alongside Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Solana (SOL).

The filing formally names XRP as an eligible commodity under a new 85/15 framework, which would let multi-asset crypto trusts gain listed status without an exchange having to seek individual SEC approval for each product.

What the Filing Actually Says

The proposal is targeting Rule 8.201-E, which governs how commodity-based trust shares get listed on NYSE Arca. Right now, every asset in one of these trusts must independently meet specific eligibility criteria.

The new rule would drop that requirement. Instead, a trust would only need at least 85% of its net asset value in qualifying assets, with the remaining 15% free to hold assets that would not otherwise clear the bar.

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, and XRP are each explicitly named in the filing as assets that already qualify. All four meet the criteria on two counts: each one underlies a futures contract that has been trading on a regulated market for at least six months, and there is an ETF providing at least 40% economic exposure to each.

To illustrate how the rule would work in practice, the filing used a hypothetical trust holding $95 million in BTC, ETH, SOL, and XRP, alongside $5 million in other digital assets that do not meet the eligibility standards. Because the qualifying assets represent 95% of the portfolio, well above the 85% threshold, the trust would satisfy the listing requirements under the proposed change.

It is also worth noting that Nasdaq filed an essentially identical proposal under SR-NASDAQ-2026-032. NYSE Arca also pointed to two prior SEC approvals as precedent: the Grayscale Digital Large Cap Fund and Bitwise’s 10 Crypto Index ETF, both of which were cleared under a comparable 85% standard.

The filing also proposed excluding non-fungible assets and collectibles from the definition of eligible commodities, since those were never contemplated when the original generic listing standards were drawn up.

The SEC now has up to 45 days from the Federal Register publication date to act on the proposal, with the option to extend that to 90 days.

XRP Price Context and ETF Flows

While analysts like ChartNerd described the development as “massive” for XRP, the token is struggling to wring itself away from the broader market weakness, trading for about $1.39 at the time of writing, which marked a 2% dip in the last 24 hours as well as a 3% decline over seven days.