SEC Chair Paul Atkins has directed agency staff to begin collecting public feedback on new types of exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded products. It’s the kind of directive that sounds procedural but carries real weight for anyone watching how Washington’s posture toward financial innovation is shifting.
The instruction effectively puts the industry on notice: the SEC is reconsidering how it evaluates novel ETF structures, and it wants to hear from both investors and fund sponsors before drawing new lines in the sand.
A different playbook from the top
Here’s the thing. The SEC under former Chair Gary Gensler took a notably cautious approach to complex exchange-traded products. Back in October 2021, Gensler publicly warned about the risks that complex ETPs posed to retail investors, a stance that effectively slowed innovation in the space and left several product proposals gathering dust on agency desks.
Atkins is reading from a different script entirely. By proactively asking staff to solicit outside perspectives, he’s signaling that the default posture is no longer skepticism but curiosity. That’s a meaningful distinction when you’re a fund issuer trying to bring a new product to market.
