BlackRock named Citi, Citadel, and Goldman Sachs as Bitcoin buyers for the ETF.

BlackRock revealed the names of four more Wall Street firms participating in buying Bitcoin for iShares. Bitcoin BTC

-2.22%
Trust ETFs.

According to an amendment to ETF Form S-1 filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last Friday, Citi, Goldman Sachs, UBS, and Citadel are the world’s largest asset managers to support physical bitcoin. It joins JP Morgan and JP Morgan as official participants in the ETF.

It is still unclear exactly when the company will be recognized as an approved participant. BlackRock could not immediately respond to The Block’s request for comment.

Is the institution ‘ashamed’?

According to Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg, one possibility is that the stigma surrounding the cryptocurrency industry led companies to provide liquidity to ETFs for several weeks without publicly declaring their participation in the fund.

The timing of these companies appearing as APs may be a sign of a change in attitude toward the industry. said This article was posted on X on Friday.

Balchunas said investment firms “were (probably) shy about getting IDs (as authorized participants in spot Bitcoin ETFs) before (Bitcoin’s resurgence), but are now cool, perhaps as a result of the ETF’s massive flows/success.” It will be.”

Institutional investors are increasingly participating in spot Bitcoin ETFs as Bitcoin price surge increases investor preference for cryptocurrencies. As of Thursday, the fund’s total trading volume was about $190 billion.

As spot Bitcoin ETFs have surged in popularity, the price of the underlying asset has also surged. As of this writing, Bitcoin is trading at $67,792, according to price data from The Block. Prices are up more than 40% since the day before a spot Bitcoin ETF application received regulatory approval in the United States for the first time.

Disclaimer: The Block is an independent media outlet delivering news, research and data. As of November 2023, Foresight Ventures is a majority investor in The Block. Foresight Ventures invests in other companies in the cryptocurrency space. Cryptocurrency exchange Bitget is an anchor LP of Foresight Ventures. The Block continues to operate independently to provide objective, impactful and timely information about the cryptocurrency industry. Below are our current financial disclosures.

© 2023 The Block. All rights reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not provided or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial or other advice.