Franklin Templeton's exchange-traded fund (ETF) tracking the price of cryptocurrency ether will charge an annualized fee of 0.19% of its net asset value, with a six-month waiver for the first $10 billion it accrues, it said on Friday.

The Franklin Ethereum ETF is one of several such funds that could be listed in the coming weeks after the Securities and Exchange Commission approved applications from exchange operators Nasdaq, CBOE and NYSE.

Fees will be a major factor in luring investors, especially since some may prefer to hold ether directly through crypto exchanges like Coinbase, eliminating the need for an ETF.

Competing asset managers were also engaged in a fee war in January, when the SEC gave the green light to their spot bitcoin ETFs.

The Franklin Ethereum ETF is expected to be listed on the CBOE BZX Exchange under the ticker symbol "EZET." Its bitcoin counterpart, the Franklin Bitcoin ETF, is listed on the same exchange.

(Reporting by Niket Nishant in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar and Maju Samuel)