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Majority of institutional investors ready to buy digital assets, study says

A new study found that institutional investors’ appetite for digital assets, including cryptocurrencies, is growing.

New data shows that institutional investors’ interest in cryptocurrencies and crypto-related businesses is continuing to grow. 

Fidelity Digital Assets, the crypto arm of the global asset management giant Fidelity Investments Inc, tasked Coalition Greenwich to survey 1,100 institutional investors to understand their expectations regarding digital asset investments.

The majority of surveyed investors expected to invest in digital assets in the future.

The survey was conducted between December 2020 and April 2021 with the participation of high net worth investors, family offices, digital and traditional hedge funds, financial advisors and endowments, Reuters reported.

The definition of digital asset investment defined by the survey team included investing in cryptocurrencies directly, buying crypto-related company stocks, or exposure through other investment products.

Some 70% of participants expect to invest in digital assets within the next five years. Nine in 10 of those interested in investing foresee their company's or their clients' portfolios to add digital assets within the same time window.

Related: Fidelity to hire more crypto hands amid growing institutional interest

Fidelity Digital is working to keep up with the institutional interest in digital assets. Recently, the company was said to increase its staff size by about 70% to handle the growing appetite from institutional investors.

Grayscale is another player in the institutional investment game. Aside from cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) or Ether (ETH), the digital asset management firm also plans to enter into the decentralized finance (DeFi) world.

Yesterday, Grayscale announced a new investment vehicle targeted at DeFi assets

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Institutional investors load up ETH, with its share of AUM hitting a new record

Institutional investors continue to exit BTC in favor of ETH, with Ether investment products now representing more than one-quarter of institutional crypto AUM.

Institutional demand for Ethereum continues to surge, with Ether products now representing more than one quarter of the assets under management (AUM) of crypto investment products.

According to CoinShares’ June 1 Digital Asset Fund Flows Weekly report, the past week saw significant institutional inflows of $74 million as investors sought to capitalize on the fall out from the recent crash in which many crypto assets lost more than 50% of their value.

More than 63% of institutional inflows were injected into Ether products, or $46.8 million of the total. Ether products now represent 27% of the combined AUM for crypto investment products — the highest share yet.

Significant inflows were also made to products offering exposure to multiple crypto assets ($11.1 million) as well as funds targeting Cardano ($5.2 million), XRP ($4.5 million), and Polkadot ($3.8 million).

Outflows from Bitcoin products have slowed, with roughly $4 million in capital exiting the markets — down from last week’s $110.9 million in outflows. Over the past three weeks, $246 million has exited BTC investment products.

Despite Bitcoin’s 30-day inflows of $47.9 million currently equating to roughly one-third of Ether’s $147.7 million, Bitcoin still dominates year-to-date inflows with nearly $4.4 billion compared to Ether’s $973 million.

However, Ether’s recent momentum has given rise to renewed speculation as to whether Ethereum is gearing up to flip Bitcoin, with Ethereum currently beating out crypto’s honeybadger by transaction count, volume, and fees, and trade volume.

According to CoinGecko, Ether is currently the second-most traded crypto asset with $38.8 billion in daily volume, ranking behind only Tether’s $103 billion. Roughly $32.9 worth of BTC changed hands over the past 24 hours.

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Institutions dump BTC as volume soars for Ether funds

Institutional investors appear to have offloaded nearly $100 million worth of Bitcoin exposure this past week while Ether investment product volumes surged.

CoinShares’ weekly Digital Asset Fund Flows report has revealed last week saw the largest Bitcoin in the report’s history as Elon Musk’s Twitter account again wreaked havoc in the crypto markets.

The May 17 report notes $98 million exited Bitcoin investment products last week, equating to 0.2% of total assets under management, or AUM. “While small, this marks the largest outflow we have recorded,” CoinShares noted.

Amid the tumultuous market conditions for Bitcoin, institutional investors appear to have ramped up their accumulation of Ether and other alternative cryptocurrencies, with the report identifying inflows to crypto asset investment products of $48 million when excluding Bitcoin.

Ethereum represented more than half of flows to altcoin investment products with $27 million. Cardano and Polkadot also saw increased inflows of $6 million and $3.3 million respectively.

CoinShares also notes that May is shaping up to be the first month in which investment volume for institutional Ether products has outpaced that of Bitcoin products. The report stated:

“The data impl[ies] that investors have been diversifying out of Bitcoin and into altcoin investment products.”

Digital asset investment products saw a net outflow of $50 million, marking the first week to post a net outflow since October 2020.

The institutional pivot towards Ether and altcoins reflects recent trends in the broader crypto asset ecosystem, with Bitcoin market dominance sinking to a three-year low of roughly 40% as of May 17.

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