an exchangetraded fund backed by physical bitcoin is still far off says the man behind the secondever bitcoin futures etf the valkyrie bitcoin strategy etf btf an actively managed product that holds a mix of frontmonth bitcoin futures contracts treasurys corporate bonds and cash followed in proshares footsteps last week valkyries etf launch attracted 10 million in the first 5 minutes of trading unfortunately for bitcoin etf hopefuls these debuts dont necessarily bring the securities and exchange commission any closer to approving etfs based on spot bitcoin valkyrie funds chief investment officer steven mcclurg told cnbcs etf edge on monday i dont think we see a bitcoin spot etf until at least middle of next year mcclurg said the staff is still trying to get their heads around what exactly is going on with these exchanges theyre trying to put a little bit more regulatory structure around them before they  move forward with this more than a dozen firms have filed for etfs tracking bitcoin itself but none have received sec approval due to regulatory concerns including issues around custody however the secs first hard deadline is approaching it must approve or deny vanecks proposal for a physical bitcoin etf by nov 14 in the meantime some are jumping on the futures bandwagon with vaneck slated to be next to market though btf didnt make as big of a splash as proshares billiondollar debut valkyries strategy could pay off in the long run mcclurg said were ok with having a fraction of what proshares has proshares is a goliath were a brandnew issuer mcclurg said we also right now care more about the spread weve been trading within a penny out there he said we also care about tracking error those are things that are really going to matter in the long run and if we can keep those things really tight in the first few weeks then i think that were really going to be the longterm play here btf gained more than 4 on thursday the proshares bitcoin strategy etf bito climbed nearly 4