Outspoken Bitcoin proponent Max Keiser has thrown his weight behind the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's apparent unwillingness to greenlight a spot Ethereum exchange-traded fund anytime soon.

As speculation swirls around the SEC potentially rejecting applications for an Ethereum ETF product in May, the famous "Bitcoin maximalist" took to social media to voice his support for regulators' hesitancy. Keiser blasted Ethereum as a "proof-of-stake scam" undeserving of the SEC's stamp of approval.

"I, for one, applaud the SEC's reticence to approve an ETH ETF," Keiser proclaimed to his million-plus social media followers. "Ethereum transitioned to proof-of-stake which is little more than a counterfeiting scheme to enrich insiders at the expense of public interest."

The fierce Bitcoin advocate joins a growing chorus of industry voices expressing pessimism over the SEC greenlighting a spot Ethereum product for trading on U.S. markets, at least in 2024.

Just this week, executives from major crypto asset managers VanEck and CoinShares both affirmed they expect the SEC to reject all Ethereum ETF applications for the foreseeable future. VanEck's CEO cited the agency's unwillingness to provide substantive feedback on its filings as cause for concern.

For Keiser and other "Bitcoin maximalists", the SEC's apparent reluctance validates their long-held view that Ethereum's proof-of-stake consensus is fundamentally a "quintessential shitcoin scam."

Drawing on inflammatory rhetoric, Keiser further asserted that Ethereum's PoS transition represented nothing more than a "counterfeiting mechanism under the guise of DeFi for the wealthy elite to get even wealthier."

While harsh, the Bitcoin evangelist's diatribe taps into a simmering schism within the cryptocurrency space over the merits and shortcomings of proof-of-stake validation models.

Ethereum shifted to proof-of-stake in 2022 via The Merge, an upgrade hailed for drastically reducing the blockchain's environmental impact but also concentrating control among a relatively small pool of staking entities.

Bitcoin maximalists have pounced on what they view as proof-of-stake's centralization risks and lack of a provably scarce monetary policy as disqualifying factors making it anathema to the core ethos of decentralization.

For the SEC, such ideological disputes may factor into its risk calculus when evaluating Ethereum investment vehicles. However, the predominant sticking points cited relate to lingering legal ambiguities around Ethereum's security status and potential vulnerabilities to market manipulation.

Still, Keiser and others interpret the delays as tacit endorsement of Bitcoin's "hard money" principles over proof-of-stake's "permissioned system based on nepotism and cronyism."

As the SEC's May deadline for Ethereum ETF decisions looms, the agency faces mounting pressure to clearly articulate its position. Whatever its determination, the resulting fallout seems poised to inflame factional rifts in an already polarized corner of the Web3 world.