By
Temitope Olatunji
April 24th, 2024
The Bitwise Crypto Innovators ETF will track crypto companies dealing with digital currency products and services. It won’t have any direct investment in digital currencies or through any derivatives.
One of the world’s largest cryptocurrency asset managers Bitwise has recently filed a new prospectus with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a new exchange-traded-fund (ETF) that tracks the performance of crypto innovators.
The Bitwise Crypto Innovators ETF will track the performance of the companies in the Bitwise Crypto Innovators Index. The fund manager filed the form N1-A with the SEC last week on February 5, disclosing its intent for the new ETF. The Crypto Innovators fund will track the performance of crypto companies like exchanges, custodians, ad wallets.
Apart from that, the prospectus also includes financial service providers leveraging blockchain technology or cryptocurrencies. The filing notes:
“The term “Crypto Innovators” generally refers to companies that service and transact in the segment of the economy dealing with crypto assets and distributed ledger technology.”
Thus, it will only track companies that have 75% of their revenue from the crypto sector. Or else those companies which have over 75% of their net assets held in cryptocurrencies.
The proposed ETF by Bitwise notes that it will not directly invest in digital currencies or via derivatives. Besides, the fund will also avoid dealings with Initial Coin Offerings.
ETF and Other Crypto-Centric Products from Bitwise
The cryptocurrency fund manager Bitwise is making some fresh efforts to bring other crypto-centric products to the market. Last week on February 2, Bitwise unveiled its plan to list a Bitcoin fund on the OTC markets. The Bitwise Bitcoin Fund will be publicly traded on the OTCQX venue. Bitwise President Teddy Fusaro said:
“We are tremendously excited to take the Bitwise Bitcoin Fund down the path recently taken by the Bitwise 10 Crypto Index Fund (OTCQX: BITW). We have been managing this fund since 2018, offering investors a cost-effective, convenient, and secure means of gaining investment exposure to bitcoin, and are excited to potentially see shares of the fund quoted on OTCQX.”
Upon approval, shares of the Bitwise Bitcoin Fund will be available for trading on the traditional brokerage accounts. Similarly, the shares will be available for custody with different custodians. In short, the Bitwise Bitcoin Fund will trade similar to the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC).
Previously, Bitwise has also worked on the Bitcoin ETF plans similar to VanEck. But last year in January 2020 it has to withdraw its application from the SEC.