This is an important shift because the first U.S. spot Ethereum ETFs launched without staking, even though staking is one of Ethereum’s core economic features. According to reports, that first wave of products still attracted strong investor interest, with 1.07 billion$ worth of shares traded on the first day. However, those funds were limited to holding unstaked ETH only.
BlackRock is now trying to close that gap within a standard brokerage product. The company said ETHB expands its digital asset lineup alongside IBIT and ETHA, and described those two earlier products as the largest Bitcoin and Ether ETPs in their category, with more than 55 billion$ and 6.5 billion$ in assets under management respectively.
ETHB charges a 0.25% sponsor fee, although BlackRock is temporarily reducing that fee for the first 12 months. The rate falls to 0.12% on the first 2.5 billion$ in assets. According to the fund page, net assets stood at 106.1 million$ as of March 12, while distributions to investors are listed as monthly.
From spot exposure to on-chain yield
The main innovation lies in how the fund uses its Ethereum holdings. In BlackRock’s prospectus, the trust states that under normal market conditions it intends to stake between 70% and 95% of its ETH holdings, while keeping part of the assets unstaked to maintain liquidity and support potential redemptions.
The documents also state that staking rewards are expected to be distributed monthly, but no less frequently than quarterly. That changes the product from a simple price-tracking vehicle into a fund designed to pass through part of Ethereum’s native network income to investors.
Coinbase and validator infrastructure are central to the model
The documents also show how heavily this market depends on a relatively small group of infrastructure providers. Coinbase Custody Trust Company serves as the Ethereum custodian for the fund, while Coinbase Inc. acts as the primary execution agent.
According to the prospectus, the custodian has exclusive control over withdrawal keys held in cold storage, while validator operators only control validator keys that cannot transfer or withdraw the fund’s ETH. As of the date of the prospectus, the approved validators were Figment, Galaxy Blockchain Infrastructure, and Attestant.
The same document states that the sponsor’s share and the primary execution agent’s share together account for 18% of gross staking rewards, with the remainder retained by the trust. Coinbase also said separately that ETHB gives investors access to staking rewards through ordinary brokerage accounts, and that the company serves as the primary custodian for ETHB and more than 80% of U.S. crypto ETPs.
The U.S. Ether ETF market is already moving forward
BlackRock is not the only player moving beyond simple spot exposure. REX Shares says its ESK fund, launched on September 25, 2025, became the first U.S.-listed ETF to combine spot Ethereum exposure with staking rewards. Grayscale is now marketing ETHE as the Grayscale Ethereum Staking ETF and also includes a separate Grayscale Ethereum Staking Mini ETF in its broader lineup.
At the same time, BlackRock said it oversees roughly 130 billion$ across crypto ETPs, tokenized liquidity funds, and stablecoin reserve management products. The company also said iShares captured about 95% of all industry inflows into digital asset ETPs in 2025. At the time of writing, Ethereum was trading near 2,108$.
Taken together, these figures show that the U.S. fund market is no longer limited to simple exposure to crypto prices. The next stage is the packaging of on-chain yield into regulated investment products that can sit in the same portfolio alongside stocks and bonds.
