Morgan Stanley filed an amended registration statement for the proposed Ethereum and Solana ETF trusts on June 18, setting an annual delegated sponsor fee of 0.14% for both products.
Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg, said the proposed fees are the lowest among ETH and SOL products worldwide.
The ETH trust will trade on the NYSE Arca under the ticker MSSE and will track Ether and staking rewards from a portion of its holdings. SOL Trust (MSOL) plans to own up to 100% of Solana.
BlackRock’s iShares Ethereum Trust ETF (ETHA) has a sponsorship fee of 0.25%, Grayscale’s Mini Ether (ETH) product starts at 0.15%, Bitwise’s Solana Staking ETF (BSOL) starts at 0.20%, and Franklin Templeton’s Solana ETF (SOEZ) has a net expense ratio of 0.19%.
This filing is preliminary and the SEC must declare both registration statements effective before the stock can be traded. Neither application met that threshold.
Fees for the position
Morgan Stanley’s 14 basis points in crypto ETFs shows the firm anticipates where the institutional allocation debate will go.
Bitcoin ETFs solved the access problem for institutional investors, and BlackRock’s IBIT assets under management exceeded $70 billion within 18 months of launch.
The next question for asset managers and advisors is whether ETH and SOL, packaged cheaply and securely enough, can occupy the second line of the digital asset sleeve alongside Bitcoin.
Morgan Stanley’s 0.14% fee positions these products as portfolio building blocks before the allocation question has a widely accepted answer.
The ETH Trust intends to stake between 50% and 80% of its holdings under normal market conditions, with the staking service provider and custodian receiving a total of 5% of the expected rewards and the Trust retaining the remainder.
SOL Trust further expands on that model by allowing up to 100% of your holdings to be staked under the same 95% trust holding structure, with delegated sponsors explicitly receiving no portion of the staking rewards.
Using Bitwise’s disclosed total staking reward rate of 6.28% for the same period as a market benchmark, a full staking SOL product that retains 95% of the rewards would generate approximately 5.97% before paying the 14 bps fee.
For ETH, if the hypothetical total staking yield is 3% when staking 50% to 80%, the staking contribution that will be deferred will be approximately 1.29% to 2.14% excluding fees.
Advisors comparing these products are comparing the economics of staking net of fees (total yield, staking share, 95% retention in trust, etc.), which together determine the effective cost of exposure.
| product | headline fee | staking share | Retaining trust rewards | Example of retained earnings before fees | Illustration of online after-sale fees |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Morgan Stanley ETH Trust | 0.14% | 50%-80% of ETH | 95% | 1.43%～2.28% | 1.29%～2.14% |
| Morgan Stanley SOL Trust | 0.14% | Up to 100% of SOL | 95% | 5.97% | 5.83% |
What Flow Data supports
Institutional rotation to ETH and SOL will occur intermittently throughout 2026, with temporary demand and no permanent system in place.
In the CoinShares week reported on May 18, Bitcoin products absorbed $982 million in outflows, while SOL withdrew $55.1 million in inflows and ETH recorded $249 million in outflows.
According to US spot ETF data around May 25th, the BTC ETF lost approximately 16,595 BTC in seven days, while the SOL ETF added 192,835 SOL (approximately $16.58 million) and the ETH ETF lost 105,862 ETH.
Through the reported week of June 1st, BTC recorded $1.44 billion in outflows and ETH recorded $257 million in outflows, while positive funds totaled $20.3 million for XRP, $10.8 million for Hyperliquid, and $7.6 million for NEAR.
On June 17th, the US Spot ETH ETF recorded inflows of 9,361 ETH (approximately $16.4 million) in one day, but 7-day ETH inflows were still negative at the end of the week.
The pattern for these weeks has been that while SOL has picked up temporary demand, ETH has lagged the pace of Bitcoin’s own outflows, and alternative-specific bidding has landed on XRP and HyperLiquid, with the ETH/SOL pair failing to attract sustained bidding as a standalone.
Morgan Stanley assumes rotation indicates that the data is temporary and incomplete. The bank operates in 42 countries and Morgan Stanley Investment Management reports approximately $1.8 trillion in assets under management or supervision as of September 30, 2025.
This distribution scope means that the 14 bps fee is also a bid for shelf space for advisors. MSSE and MSOL are already priced to beat the comparison when Morgan Stanley branch asset managers decide to add crypto exposure other than Bitcoin.
Two timelines for the same bet
In the bullish case, we would need over 4 weeks of combined ETH and SOL inflows while Bitcoin flows level off, with weekly SOL inflows moving from tens of millions to hundreds of millions.
If this rotation happens, 14 bps will become a structural weapon. Competitors operating between 0.19% and 0.25% will face the choice of lowering their fees or ceding market share to brands with Morgan Stanley’s reach.
With a full-stake SOL product that retains 95% of its rewards at 14 bps, it’s hard to justify the economics with numbers alone compared to its 20 bps non-staking competitors.
The bearish case is that the macro backdrop exposes financial institutions to Bitcoin-only or cash-equivalent exposure for longer than anticipated in the product filing schedule.
The Federal Reserve has kept interest rates on hold at 3.50% to 3.75% until mid-2026, with nearly half of policymakers expecting a rate hike this year, and the outlook for inflation has been revised upward.
In that environment, the allocation case for ETH and SOL as portfolio components will face tougher cost of capital arguments than in 2024.
Low fees and staking yields require an allocation case that advisors can justify to clients before capital inflows materialize.
The SEC’s effectiveness schedule adds further procedural uncertainty. The handling of staking, storage arrangements, and tax treatment may all require further revision before trading in any product.
The prize Morgan Stanley is vying for is shelf space for advisors in the allocation cycle associated with Bitcoin normalization.
By the time financial institutions widely accept ETH and SOL as portfolio eligible, Morgan Stanley’s crypto ETF, with its low fees and staking pass-through, could have a structural first-mover advantage.
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