Bitwise began trading the first US spot Near ETF on Tuesday on NYSE Arca under the ticker NRR, with a 0.75% annual fee, according to the firm. The fund holds actual NEAR tokens rather than futures contracts, giving US investors brokerage-account exposure to the layer-1 blockchain without a crypto exchange account or wallet.

The launch arrives after a sharp run in the underlying asset. NEAR traded around $5.09 on Binance on Tuesday, roughly triple its August lows near $1.60, at a market capitalization of about $6.5 billion. The token remains down roughly 75% from its all-time high above $20. A previous spike in May — a 28% gain in 24 hours tied to privacy, AI and scaling upgrades — faded back toward $2 over the summer.

Near is a base-layer network in the same category as Ethereum and Solana, live since 2020. Its AI positioning traces to co-founder Illia Polosukhin, a co-creator of the Transformer architecture behind ChatGPT-style models. Near opened an AI research lab in May 2024 under Polosukhin and co-founder Alex Skidanov. Bitwise also cites Near Intents, a cross-chain asset-swapping service that has processed more than $32 billion in volume, in its investment case.

"We're moving toward a world in which AI agents increasingly act on our behalf, coordinate with one another, and participate in the economy," Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley said in a statement. "We believe this shift—to an agentic economy where more and more happens through AI agents—could unlock an enormous new frontier for the global economy. NEAR is building a platform for that future."

The fund's operational model includes staking. Bitwise says its in-house team will stake the fund's NEAR holdings to capture average rewards of about 5%, which accrue to shareholders as growth in net asset value per share. The company cautions the rewards are not guaranteed. Its disclosures flag slashing risk — penalties imposed when a validator breaks network rules — and note the fund holds a single asset, warning investors could lose a significant portion or all of their capital. The 0.75% fee equates to $75 per year on every $10,000 invested.

The filing history behind NRR tracks a shifting regulatory environment. Bitwise registered a Delaware trust for a Near fund in April 2025, when the token traded at $2.61. Grayscale followed in January 2026, seeking to convert its existing Near trust into an ETF while NEAR sat near $1.54 — a conversion that would create a second US-listed wrapper for the same asset.

The path cleared materially in September 2025, when the SEC approved generic listing standards allowing exchanges to list qualifying crypto funds without product-by-product approval. Litecoin, Hedera and Solana funds reached the market the following October, including Bitwise's own Solana staking ETF. NRR extends that template to a staking single-asset product built around an AI-native network narrative.

With Grayscale's conversion filing pending and the generic listing framework now in place, NEAR is positioned to gain a second US-listed vehicle — and the competitive fee pressure that typically follows — in the near term.