Grayscale withdraws Cardano ETF registration as ADA hits CME futures milestone

Cardano's ADA traded near $0.20 after Grayscale withdrew the registration statement for its proposed Grayscale Cardano Trust ETF, a setback that overshadowed a milestone many traders had been watching for spot ETF eligibility. SEC filings show Grayscale submitted a Form RW on August 7 to withdraw the S-1 for the Cardano fund, and the firm said the registration statement had not been declared effective and that no securities had been issued or sold under it. The withdrawal came just before August 9, when Cardano completed six months of regulated CME futures trading, a requirement tied to the SEC’s generic listing standards that can support a more streamlined path for spot crypto ETF listings. Earlier market expectations had pointed to a possible late-October 2026 decision window for the proposed fund, ticker GADA, if it had become effective after the eligibility date, but that timeline is no longer in play. At the time of writing, ADA was down 0.5% over 24 hours at $0.195 after touching an intraday high of $0.199. The token fell over the weekend before rebounding early Monday from $0.194. Traders are now watching whether the recovery can hold, with $0.211 seen as the next upside area and $0.232, near the daily 200 SMA, as a further target. Support was identified around $0.17 in the event of renewed weakness. Even with the ETF setback, Cardano's broader development story remains active. The scope for Phase 1 of the Dijkstra hard fork has been frozen, with Nested Transactions and Linear Leios targeted for mainnet by the end of 2026, while Phase 2, Peras, is planned for an intra-era hard fork in the second quarter of 2027. Cardano has also connected to Injective, allowing ADA and INJ to move across both ecosystems.