As I understand, Gemini (the Winkles' exchange) depends only on ordinary bureaucratic licenses (MSB, MTB, whatever). If Coinbase can function, they should be able to function too (unless they are based in NY and have to wait for the BitLicense because of that).
The COIN ETF is more complicated: it must be approved by the SEC, which is not just a bureaucratic formality. There is no way to tell how long the SEC will take to decide, or whather it will get approved at all. (In fact, I have read somewhere that, the longer the SEC takes to decide, the less likely is that it will be approved.)
whather
I'm sure Kathleen Moriarty has the skills needed, but this is a much bigger game than her getting ETFs approved by SEC through her carreer. The dollar and banking is at stake. At the same time, I think the people with power has realized that they have no good weapons to shut down bitcoin. I think they are just manipulating the price / stalling and trying to time everything in their favor. But I could be wrong (as I usually am when wearing my tinfoil hat.)
The US government can if they want to. All they need to do is arrest key people in the Bitcoin community for distributing an illegal alternative to the legal national currency and make a statement saying that the use of bitcoin is illegal. No lawmakers need to get involved, they have all the precedence they need. If they made it a priority to stop the use of bitcoin internationally they would make it part of their foreign policy and you would see one country after another fall in line. And Norway would be that annoying kid that does it very quickly and then starts pestering the other countries to do it too.
there is no such thing as an "illegal alternative" in the legal money sphere, in fact the FRB is on very shaky constitutional ground running their irredeemable federal reserve debt note scam considering that the only constitutional money is gold and silver coin. Bitcoin is not counterfeiting anything, it is a new form of property, you would need to destroy property law precedents to destroy bitcoin 'legally' as you suggest. Besides game theory almost dictates that the incentives are now aligned for US govt. to try and "work with" bitcoin and profit form the innovation than fight against it ... it's just the banks will be dragging their heels and toes and fingers scratching frantically.