Asset manager Morgan Stanley has set fees at 0.14 percent each for spot exchange-traded funds tracking ethereum and solana that it plans to introduce to the U.S. market.

Cointelegraph reported on June 22 that Morgan Stanley submitted amended S-1 registration statements for the two products to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, disclosing a fee structure lower than competing products.

The 0.14 percent fee disclosed this time is among the lowest for U.S. spot ethereum and spot solana ETFs. Based on Farside Investors data, the lowest fee among U.S. spot ethereum ETFs is 0.15 percent for Grayscale’s Ethereum Staking Mini ETF, while Franklin Templeton’s Franklin Solana ETF charges 0.19 percent among U.S. spot solana ETFs. Morgan Stanley is entering with lower fees for both products. Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas (에릭 발추나스) assessed on X, formerly Twitter, that the fees are the cheapest not only in the United States but also globally.

The market views the amended filing as a signal that the approval process is nearing its final stage. This is the second time Morgan Stanley has revised the filing since it first applied in January. If the SEC approves trading, the products will become the 11th spot ethereum ETF and the seventh spot solana ETF in the United States.

Morgan Stanley has already used the same strategy in spot bitcoin ETFs. It also set the fee at 0.14 percent for a spot bitcoin ETF launched in April, lowering it below Grayscale’s Mini Bitcoin ETF fee of 0.15 percent.

This low-price strategy is seen as a move by latecomer Morgan Stanley to secure market share. The U.S. spot crypto ETF market is currently led by large managers such as BlackRock and Fidelity. In this situation, Morgan Stanley is positioning price competitiveness at the forefront to attract inflows.

The performance of its spot bitcoin ETF partly shows the effect of that strategy. Morgan Stanley’s spot bitcoin ETF drew $30.6 million in inflows on its first day of listing, and cumulative inflows later rose to $331 million. That exceeds the figures for related ETFs from Invesco, Franklin Templeton and CoinShares launched in January 2024.

The filing also includes a staking structure. Figment, Galaxy Blockchain Infrastructure and Coinbase Canada will provide staking services for the two ETFs. Each fund will take a 5 percent fee on staking rewards. It is effectively designing a staking reward revenue structure while lowering spot ETF fees.

Product names and tickers were also disclosed. The spot ethereum ETF is the Morgan Stanley Ethereum Trust, with ticker MSSE. The solana ETF is the Morgan Stanley Solana Trust and is set to trade under ticker MSOL.

There are two points to watch. One is when the SEC will actually allow trading after the amended filings are submitted. The other is whether Morgan Stanley’s ultra-low fee strategy will translate into inflows in an already highly competitive spot crypto ETF market. As it applies the same pricing policy to spot ethereum and solana ETFs, the possibility has grown that fee-cut competition among asset managers will expand further.

Morgan Stanley Ether and Solana ETFs nearing launch. The fee on each is going to be 14bps making them the cheapest in U.S. and world. https://t.co/8pLJIj8DI7