By
Steve Muchoki
April 25th, 2024
Valkyrie Investments’ ETF will focus on firms that employ at least 77% renewable energy.
The crypto asset management and investment firm Valkyrie Investments recently got approval from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its Bitcoin mining ETF and has gone live on Nasdaq starting Tuesday. Listed under the ticker WGMI – an acronym for ‘We’re gonna make it’, popular among the crypto community, the ETF will be focused on sustainable bitcoin mining firms using renewable energy for most of its energy consumption.
About the Valkyrie Bitcoin Mining ETF
Officially called the Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI), the ETF has an expense ratio of 0.75% and will offer direct exposure to the stocks of bitcoin mining firms. It will focus on firms that employ at least 77% renewable energy i.e., energy derived from natural sources like sun and wind. Additionally, it will invest up to 80% of its assets in companies that make 50% and above profit from Bitcoin mining. The latter is an energy-intensive process as it needs massive energy to solve cryptographic puzzles to secure the blockchain network. Therefore, Valkyrie’s emphasis on the sustainable mining process is a step in the right direction for the crypto industry.
Some of the ETF’s biggest holdings comprise Hive Blockchain, Bitfarms, Argo Blockchain, Stronghold Digital Mining and Cleanspark. As per the SEC filing, Valkyrie’s head of ETF portfolio management is Bill Cannon, who was the former Managing Director for Guggenheim Partners, and its chief investment officer is blockchain company Theseus Capital’s founder Steven McClurg.
Valkyrie Investments’ CEO Leah Wald emphasized why the company introduced a bitcoin mining ETF citing investors’ growing interest and focus on getting more exposure to Bitcoin miners. Besides, the movement of miners from China to other places like Washington and New York was also stated as one of the reasons for the ETF by Wald.
ETFs in News
Prior to the WGMI, Valkyrie successfully introduced a bitcoin futures ETF and the Valkyrie Balance Sheet Opportunities ETF. The latter focuses on publicly traded firms having bitcoin exposure. Apart from Valkyrie a lot of other firms have filed for ETF with the SEC. Grayscale, for example, recently released its “Future of Finance” ETF in the market aimed at crypto and fintech companies. However, not all proposals have a happy ending as the SEC has rejected applications from Fidelity and First Trust Advisors and Skybridge for spot market Bitcoin ETFs citing market volatility concerns.
However, there are countries like Canada that are giving a new life to these ETFs. The country approved a Bitcoin ETF and a Bitcoin Mutual Fund by Fidelity Canada and got them listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange. ‘Purpose’ was another investment firm whose Bitcoin ETF was given the final approval by the Canadian regulators in February 2021.
Valkyrie Investments is a digital asset management firm headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. Led by industry veterans, the firm brings a vast knowledge pool of technical expertise alongside decades of relevant experience. The firm has an extensive suite of products through which it helps investors enter the evolving digital asset ecosystem.