TL;DR
- Grayscale filed an S-1 registration statement with the SEC to launch the first Worldcoin (WLD) ETF in the United States, under the ticker GWLD on Nasdaq.
- The fund would be a passive vehicle holding the native token of the World Network, with BitGo as custodian and BNY Mellon as administrator.
- The token trades at $0.3815 with a market capitalization of approximately $1.35 billion and a daily volume of $174 million.
Grayscale filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) an S-1 registration statement to launch the first exchange-traded fund linked to WLD, the native token of the biometric project Worldcoin co-founded by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.
The news pushed the token to an intraday high of $0.387, although the token has accumulated a decline of approximately 5.5% over the past seven days. At the time of publication, WLD trades at $0.3815, with a market capitalization of $1.35 billion and a daily volume of approximately $174 million, according to data from CoinMarketCap.
The fund, named Grayscale Worldcoin ETF, would trade under the ticker GWLD on Nasdaq and would track the token’s price through the CoinDesk Worldcoin Benchmark Rate. BitGo Bank & Trust would act as custodian of the digital assets, while the Bank of New York Mellon would serve as transfer agent and administrator.
The product’s structure is based on Nasdaq’s generic commodity trust listing standards, which would allow its launch without requiring a separate rule change from the SEC, once WLD meets the exchange’s eligibility criteria.
Worldcoin Remains Under Scrutiny
Worldcoin —rebranded simply as “World” in 2024— was co-founded by Altman with the goal of building a global human identity verification system. The project uses a spherical device called the Orb to scan users’ irises, assigning them a unique identifier called World ID and distributing WLD tokens to those who complete the process. The initiative has faced significant criticism and regulatory pressure over its biometric data collection in the European Union and in countries such as Brazil and Kenya.
Grayscale’s filing is not the only sign of institutional interest in WLD. In 2025, Nasdaq-listed company Eightco built the first corporate treasury around the token, accumulating one of the largest declared positions in the asset. The ETF, if approved, would be the first mechanism for retail investors in the United States to access Worldcoin through a conventional brokerage account.
