Grayscale Investments has retracted the applications for three altcoin ETFs tied to Cardano, Hedera and Polkadot. This decision terminates the latest plans that had been positioned since the year 2025. As per SEC Filings, the company provided three Form RW requests on August 7, 2026. These forms were for Grayscale Cardano Trust ETF, Grayscale Hedera Trust ETF and Grayscale Polkadot Trust ETF. As per the source, the filings were pulled out roughly within 190 seconds of one another.
The move does not represent an SEC rejection. The withdrawal documents state that registration was not facilitated. Grayscale did not intend to move forward with planned share distribution.
Grayscale Pulls Three Altcoin ETF Filings
Three registration statements were filed in the year 2025. The Cardano and Polkadot applications were submitted on August 29, 2025, while the Hedera filing was filed subsequently on September 9. The redaction of the S-1 filings also comes after the exchange listing proposals were removed. NYSE Arca pulled out the Cardano listing proposal in September 2025, while Nasdaq pulled out the Polkadot and Hedera proposals in the month of November. This left the company with registration statements that had fewer immediate paths towards launch without formal exchange listing proposals.
The company has now officially retracted the remaining S-1 filings rather than keeping them available. Grayscale has not provided a specific reason for the retraction. However, the move suggests that it is to be consistent with inactive ETF plans rather than a formal governance rejection. The filings themselves state that Grayscale does not intend to move ahead with the planned distribution of the shares. The registration statement had not been declared effective and that no securities had been issued or sold under them.
ADA, HBAR and DOT Witness the Price Impact
The market reaction has been quiet. Initial report following the retraction showed no major price reaction across the three tokens. The traders view this as a selective adjustment to Grayscale’s ETF pipeline rather than a major fallback. This response was crucial because the pullout removed a potential institutional access route for ADA, HBAR, and DOT. This does not indicate that they eliminated the potential of future ETF filings.
Cardano’s ADA was already under pressure around the time of the announcement. The market reaction has not hinted at a big sell-off in ADA. Cardano was at $0.2013 on August 6, 2026 and plunged to $0.2009 on August 7, 2026. The price point does not refer to a Grayscale-centric fallout. Broader crypto market conditions and the context that the filings have already lost their formal exchange proposals make it difficult to attribute the move to the withdrawal.
For HBAR, community reaction was mixed rather than uniformly bearish. Some holders viewed the withdrawal as negative, while others said that the filing could simply be withdrawn and added later.
The withdrawal does not indicate that Grayscale cannot re-enter with new filings. Since the organization withdrew themselves, a future application could be submitted if the market demands so. The distinction is relevant for Cardano. The withdrawal came shortly before CME’s ADA futures reached six months of trading on August 9. This is an important point for the comprehensive development of governed ADA markets.
Grayscale still has other altcoin-related registration applications in the primary stages, including products tied to Bittensor, Aave, BNB, NEAR, and Zcash. That makes the plan to withdraw ADA, HBAR, and DOT more strategic than a complete retreat from the products. Grayscale removed three ETFs applications from their pipeline but did not amount to a regulatory rejection of their assets.
For ADA, HBAR, and DOT stakeholders, the immediate price reaction has been contained, leaving the question around which altcoins Grayscale chooses to push as the U.S. market for crypto investment products continue to bolster.
