![Robinhood Lists Grayscale’s Bitcoin and Ethereum Trusts Robinhood Lists Grayscale’s Bitcoin and Ethereum Trusts](https://static.news.bitcoin.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/shutterstock_1925038817.jpg)
US trading giant Robinhood is adding two cryptocurrency-related products to its lineup for retail investors. Investment asset manager Greyscale announced that the firm’s traditional investment vehicles for both Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) are launching on the Robinhood trading app. There's two new ways to access crypto on @RobinhoodApp. You can start trading $GBTC and […]
The post Trading App Giant Robinhood Lists Grayscale Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) Stocks appeared first on The Daily Hodl.
The discount brokerage has seen a steep decline in crypto-related revenue over the past 12 months as retail traders exited the market.
Digital asset manager Grayscale has made its flagship Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) products available on Robinhood, the popular trading app open to millions of retail users.
Beginning on Friday, Robinhood users will be able to trade Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) and Ethereum Trust (ETHE) directly through the app. Shares of GBTC provide investors with direct exposure to Bitcoin in the form of a security without having to buy or store the digital asset directly. ETHE, meanwhile, operates as an open-end investment company whose shares reflect the value of Ether held by the trust.
Finally! You can now trade Grayscale Bitcoin Trust and Grayscale Ethereum Trust on Robinhood$GBTC $ETHE https://t.co/MzOJxvI7GG
— Barry Silbert (@BarrySilbert) May 6, 2022
Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust is the largest investment vehicle dedicated to the leading crypto asset. As of May 2, the trust had $24.6 billion in assets under management. Grayscale’s Ethereum Trust, meanwhile, had over $329 million in assets.
Here’s a look at our 14 single asset crypto investment funds as of 5/2/2022.
— Grayscale (@Grayscale) May 2, 2022
AUM and other stats on all Grayscale products are updated daily on our website: https://t.co/smju2moRYQ$BAT $BCH $BTC $ETC $ETH $FIL $LINK $LPT $LTC $MANA $SOL $XLM $ZEC $ZEN pic.twitter.com/sv5FLsd0uW
Robinhood operates a discount brokerage that provides retail investors with low-barrier entry to financial markets, including crypto. In the first quarter, the firm’s revenue declined by 43% year-over-year as sales from cryptocurrency trading dropped by 39%. Despite the decline, Robinhood’s net cumulative funded accounts increased 27% year-over-year. Currently, Robinhood lists over 20 cryptocurrencies for trading on its platform.
Related: Robinhood axes almost 1 in 10 staff members as stock hits all-time low
Retail traders’ embrace of crypto peaked in the first half of 2021, a period that coincided with multiple record highs for Bitcoin and the broader market. However, retail interest has declined significantly since then, as evidenced by Google search trends and a lack of new capital entering the market.
CEO Michael Sonnenshein said the firm’s European rollout would be done piecemeal due to various regulatory regimes and investor attitudes.
Digital asset manager Grayscale Investments is planning to expand its product offerings into Europe to tap into growing institutional demand for cryptocurrencies in the region, CEO Michael Sonnenshein confirmed Tuesday.
In an interview with Bloomberg, Sonnenshein said the company was holding meetings with local partners to discuss how Grayscale’s suite of products would be rolled out in the region. The company hasn’t made any definitive plans regarding which exchanges and countries would be supported initially, though Grayscale plans to launch pilot tests in several markets across the European Union.
Sonnenshein explained that Grayscale would be looking at investor behaviors and local regulations in determining its product rollout. “Although the EU is unified, we don’t view the entire European market as in fact one market,” he said. “Instead we’re going to be very thoughtful, very methodical about each of the financial centers and financial hubs that we ultimately launch in.”
Grayscale is by far the world’s largest crypto fund manager, with over $35.7 billion in assets under management as of Monday. The Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, which trades under the ticker symbol GBTC, has amassed nearly $25.8 billion in assets. Meanwhile, the recently launched smart contract fund that excludes Ethereum already has more than $3.7 million under management.
Here’s a look at our 14 single asset crypto investment funds as of 4/25/2022.
— Grayscale (@Grayscale) April 25, 2022
AUM and other stats on all Grayscale products are updated daily on our website: https://t.co/1WBt5qD8Zo$BAT $BCH $BTC $ETC $ETH $FIL $LINK $LPT $LTC $MANA $SOL $XLM $ZEC $ZEN pic.twitter.com/ELHwldtB7r
Related: Institutional investment flows out of ETH and into competing L1 altcoins
Grayscale has been trying to convert its flagship GBTC product into a spot exchange-traded fund, something that the United States market currently lacks. Grayscale has expressed a willingness to take legal action against the Securities and Exchange Commission should it deny its application.
As Bloomberg noted, the European market has over 80 crypto exchange-traded products, including 60 that were launched before 2022.
Crypto asset manager Grayscale has reportedly submitted a letter to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in an attempt to get the nod for the first spot-based Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund (ETF). According to a new report by the Financial Times (FT), Grayscale recently sent a letter to the regulatory agency asking if they […]
The post Crypto Giant Grayscale Submits Letter to SEC in Bid for Approval of First Spot Bitcoin ETF: Report appeared first on The Daily Hodl.
Storm clouds are slowly fading for Grayscale and its embattled Bitcoin institutional investment product, while frustration with U.S. regulators continues to mount.
Things are looking up for the United States’ largest institutional Bitcoin (BTC) product by asset holdings as pressure mounts on regulators.
Data from on-chain monitoring resource Coinglass confirms that as of April 21, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) is rebounding toward 2022 highs.
After a problematic year so far, GBTC has benefitted from steadying Bitcoin price action.
Bitcoin’s descent from November’s all-time highs added to an already negative “premium” on GBTC, meaning that its share price in fact traded at a discount to the Bitcoin spot price. That discount hit its deepest ever in January, when the GBTC premium nearly hit -30%.
Since then, a reversal has been underway, and as of Thursday, the premium is -21.4% — near its smallest for 2022.
The premium results from trading sentiment, and Grayscale has come under pressure over the past year, especially since the approval of the first Bitcoin futures-based exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the U.S.
Grayscale CEO Michael Sonnenshein and other industry figures have been vocal critics of regulators in Washington, who while approving futures ETF products continue to reject a Bitcoin spot-based equivalent.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which approves candidates based on laws dating from as far back as 1933, has come in for particular public scorn as other countries — most recently Australia — beat the U.S. to the launch.
Earlier this month, the SEC approved another futures-based ETF, this time based on the Securities Act of 1933 act rather than the Investment Company Act of 1940 previously used. This was a milestone, Sonnenshein told CNBC this month, as it effectively backs the SEC into a corner with fewer and fewer excuses for not breaking down the barriers to entry for a spot ETF alternative.
“It really is, in our opinion, a matter of ‘when’ and not ‘if,’” he explained to the network.
“If the SEC can’t look at two like issues, the futures ETF and the spot ETF, through the same lens, then it is, in fact, potentially grounds for an Administrative Procedure Act violation.”
Matt Hougan, CEO of ETF provider Bitwise, said in the same interview that a spot ETF “is what people actually want” in terms of institutional investment products linked to Bitcoin.
As Cointelegraph reported, futures ETFs have previously faced criticism of their own as commentators argue that they solve none of the pain points that a spot product would while potentially bringing new ones of their own.
Meanwhile, a survey by Nasdaq of prospective U.S. investors revealed at over 70% of those asked would consider gaining exposure to Bitcoin via a spot ETF should one be made available.
Related: Bitcoin spot vs. futures ETFs: Key differences explained
“The vast majority of advisors we surveyed either plan to begin allocating to crypto or increase their existing allocation to crypto,” Nasdaq’s head of digital asset index research, Jake Rapaport, commented in an accompanying press release issued April 11.
“As demand continues to surge, advisors will be looking for an institutional solution to the crypto question that now dominates client conversations.”
The survey also found that 86% of advisors already invested in crypto planned to increase that exposure in the coming year.
GBTC had 640,930 BTC in holdings as of Thursday, worth $26.9 billion.
The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cointelegraph.com. Every investment and trading move involves risk, you should conduct your own research when making a decision.