Following the long-awaited launch of Jacobi Asset Management’s Jacobi FT Wilshire Bitcoin ETF, Europe will welcome its first spot Bitcoin ETF.
The London-based digital asset manager announced that its new investment product will list on Euronext Amsterdam on Aug. 15, more than a year later than its original 2022 launch date.
As previously reported by Cointelegraph, the product is being touted as the first spot or physical backed bitcoin (BTC) fund that will allow investors to gain exposure to financial products backed by physical BTC.
The new exchange-traded fund (ETF), which will trade under the symbol BCOIN, was approved by the Guernsey Financial Services Commission back in October 2021. report According to Blockworks’ plans, Fidelity Digital Assets will handle the custody portion of the BCOIN ETF.
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The asset manager also highlighted the fund’s environmentally and socially friendly nature, adding a Renewable Energy Certificate (REC) to the ETF.
The fund uses external data to measure the energy usage of the Bitcoin network and buys and scraps REC. REC also conducts accounting through blockchain services, designed to allow investors to verify the fund’s environmental claims.
bitcoin Get real-time average bitcoin price data from select cryptocurrency exchanges with the FT Wilshire Bitcoin Mixed Price Index. Spot ETFs allow investors to gain exposure to the bitcoin market without directly owning or hosting the underlying asset.
The launch of a spot bitcoin ETF marks a milestone in Europe, while U.S. regulators have yet to approve many similar spot bitcoin ETF applications from major asset managers including BlackRock and Fidelity.
Jacobi CEO Martin Bednall issued a statement highlighting the continent’s progressive attitude towards cryptocurrency investment products as a potential catalyst for further adoption:
“It is exciting to see Europe ahead of the US in opening up Bitcoin investments to institutional investors looking to securely and reliably access the benefits of the digital asset using a familiar and regulated structure such as our ETF.”
Prior to launching the Jacoby Bitcoin ETF, Melanion Capital launched a Bitcoin Stock ETF on Euronext Amsterdam in June 2023. The ETF is designed to track the Melanion Bitcoin Risk Index, a custom basket of closely watched European and U.S. stocks. Linked to the market price of BTC.
This differs from a spot ETF in that investors gain exposure to the fund, which is made up of shares of companies with large investments in bitcoin holdings, cryptocurrency exchanges and mining operations.
These include companies like tech firm MicroStrategy, which holds more than 140,000 BTC, as well as major bitcoin mining companies like Riot, Marathon Digital, and Hut8.
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