Bitwise launches first US spot NEAR ETF on NYSE Arca

Crypto asset manager Bitwise has launched the first US spot exchange-traded product tracking NEAR, giving investors exposure to the token through a fund trading on NYSE Arca.

The Bitwise NEAR ETF, trading under the ticker NRR, carries a 0.75% management fee and will hold NEAR directly, with Bitwise intending to stake a significant portion of the fund’s tokens.

The launch comes as activity on NEAR Intents, the network’s cross-chain transaction protocol, has increased sharply, with volume rising to more than $32 billion compared with less than $1 billion a year ago, according to Bitwise.

Bitwise chief investment officer Matt Hougan told Cointelegraph that the firm sees AI agents as a growing use case for NEAR and has already seen evidence of agents using the network. He expects that activity to increase over time, although most activity on NEAR today remains human-driven.

Hougan added that Bitwise has been working on the US NEAR ETF since launching its European NEAR exchange-traded product in June 2025. NRR joins its US lineup of single-asset crypto products tracking Bitcoin (BITB), Ether (ETHW), Solana (BSOL), XRP (XRP) and Hyperliquid (BHYP).

The NEAR token has rallied sharply over the past month, gaining about 167% to trade around $4.94 on Tuesday, according to CoinGecko data. The token is up about 81% over the past year.

AI agents put crypto payment rails in focus

NEAR is a layer-1 blockchain for decentralized applications that shifted its strategy toward AI in 2024 and has since focused increasingly on cross-chain infrastructure and autonomous AI agents.

The shift comes as major financial institutions examine how autonomous software could drive demand for blockchain-based payment infrastructure. Last week, BlackRock said in a research paper that AI agents could increase demand for stablecoins, cryptocurrencies and tokenized assets as machine-to-machine transactions become more common.

BlackRock described AI as a potential “structural catalyst” for digital asset adoption, arguing that programmable assets could be suited to high-frequency, low-value transactions that operate around the clock.

NEAR is seeking to capture some of that activity through Intents, which allows users and AI agents to specify a desired transaction while third-party solvers compete to execute it across supported blockchains.

“The design of Intents, for instance, aligns with the goal-based orientation of LLMs, and shields them from the complexity of bridging and other challenges,” Hougan told Cointelegraph.

Hougan also pointed to cross-chain usability as a key factor behind Intents’ growth. “Bridging and cross-chain abstraction has been a challenge for crypto for nearly a decade, and a lot of people have lost both time and money trying to navigate that space,” he said.

The protocol’s role in moving assets across blockchains came into focus this week after NEAR Intents said it blocked more than $50 million in attempted transfers linked to the $387.5 million Bitget hack. Its SHIELD system froze about $503,000 during execution, while roughly $166,000 in suspected stolen funds passed through the protocol.