Grayscale Wants to ETF the Eyeball Scanner: GWLD Incoming 👁️

Grayscale has filed an S-1 registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for a spot Worldcoin ETF, becoming the first asset manager to seek a U.S. exchange-traded product tied to the WLD token. The proposed Grayscale Worldcoin ETF would list on Nasdaq under the ticker GWLD and would track WLD's price through the CoinDesk Worldcoin Benchmark Rate. Under Nasdaq's generic listing standards for commodity-based trusts, the fund could launch without a separate SEC rule change once WLD satisfies the exchange's eligibility criteria.

According to the preliminary prospectus, BitGo Bank & Trust would custody the WLD tokens, while the Bank of New York Mellon would serve as transfer agent and administrator and CSC Delaware Trust Company would act as trustee. The filing does not yet disclose management fees, seed investment, authorized participants or liquidity providers. Grayscale formed the underlying trust on July 10 and filed the registration statement on July 20.

Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart confirmed the filing on X. Grayscale also stated plans to offer in-kind creations and redemptions for the fund. The filing marks Grayscale's 17th crypto-related exchange-traded product, joining existing funds tied to Bitcoin ($BTC), Ether ($ETH), Solana ($SOL), Dogecoin ($DOGE), XRP ($XRP) and Chainlink ($LINK).

WLD, an ERC-20 token built on Ethereum, is the native asset of World, a biometric verification project co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman that uses a device called the Orb to scan irises and issue World IDs meant to distinguish humans from bots. The token traded near $0.375, up roughly 3.3% on the day, and climbed to an intraday high of $0.387, an increase of about 8% over 24 hours, according to CoinGecko data. At those levels, WLD remains roughly 97% below its March 2024 peak of $11.74.

Grayscale's S-1 acknowledges material risks, noting that regulators in Spain, Portugal, Germany, Hong Kong, Brazil, Kenya and Indonesia took action against Worldcoin between 2024 and 2025 over its biometric data collection. The filing also states that the 100 largest wallets hold approximately 90% of circulating WLD and that team and investor tokens continue to unlock until around July 2028. WLD ranks as the 55th-largest cryptocurrency with a market capitalization of around $1.4 billion, per CoinGecko.

The filing adds to signs of growing institutional interest in WLD. Nasdaq-listed Eightco built the first corporate treasury around the token, and on Monday Eightco Holdings Inc. shares surged more than 3,000%, closing at $45.08 after an intraday high of $83.12, following the company's announcement of a $20 million investment from crypto miner BitMine. GWLD cannot begin trading until the SEC declares the registration effective and WLD clears Nasdaq's listing requirements.