Bitwise Asset Management, the largest crypto index fund manager in America, today announced that the Bitwise Bitcoin ETF (BITB), the company's first spot Bitcoin ETF, plans to begin trading today, January 11th.
BITB will join Bitwise's comprehensive suite of 18 crypto investment products, which currently includes five additional crypto ETFs.
“We expect significant demand for Bitcoin ETFs like BITB. Every year for the past six years, financial advisors have identified ETFs as their preferred way to help clients access Bitcoin. Last year, 64% of financial advisors preferred a spot Bitcoin ETF over existing instruments. We hear the same thing in our existing customer base, which consists of thousands of investment professionals. Now finally a spot Bitcoin ETF is coming.”
– Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley
The Bitwise Bitcoin ETF trades on the NYSE Arca under the ticker symbol BITB. The management fee is 0.20%, with the fee for the first six months set at 0% of the first $1 billion in assets. The fund will hold Bitcoin directly with the regulated digital asset custodian, Coinbase Custody. BITB's auditor is KPMG, the administrator is Bank of New York Mellon and the sponsor is Bitwise Investment Advisers.
Support from open source developers
In conjunction with the launch, Bitwise announced that the company will donate 10% of BITB's profits to three non-profit organizations that fund the open source development of Bitcoin: Brink, OpenSats and the Human Rights Foundation's Bitcoin Development Fund.
These organizations fund open source developers who play a critical role in improving the security, scalability, and usability of the Bitcoin network. Donations will be made annually for at least the next 10 years to further support the health and development of the Bitcoin ecosystem.
“Bitcoin is essentially open source software,” said Hong Kim, Bitwise’s chief technology officer. “Both Bitwise and our customers have a vested interest in its continued development, and supporting these organizations is a direct way to contribute to this.”
Founded in 2017, Bitwise currently partners with more than 1,800 advisory teams, RIAs, family offices and institutions. This number has doubled in the last two years.
Further information about BITB and the fund's prospectus can be found here.
