ARK Invest CEO Cathie Wood believes broker-dealers will only be interested in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) for top digital assets.
In a new interview with Peter McCormack at the Consensus 2024 crypto conference, Wood says major broker-dealers will likely only embrace a spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETF and an Ethereum (ETH) ETF. Wirehouses such as Morgan Stanley, UBS, Merrill Lynch, and Wells Fargo, which traditionally play an important role in the financial landscape through their extensive services and influence, are crucial to the adoption of new financial products.
So far, only Bitcoin ETFs have been launched. But it now seems possible that ETH ETFs could be launched later this year. Crypto insiders believe ETFs for other crypto assets could soon follow:
“I don’t think the wirehouses will accept- there could be two, these two [BTC en ETH ETF’s]. Maybe Solana. Maybe. But I don’t think the wirehouse platforms want to do more than the main assets, just to give their clients exposure to this new asset class.
What I do think is, and we have some of them, that private funds will sift through the thousands out there and probably find 20 or 30, but you have to do a tremendous amount of due diligence because, as you say, there’s a lot of nonsense going on. ”
Wood also says that since the approval of spot BTC ETFs – ARK is one of those that launched an ETF for Bitcoin – wirehouses are doing their due diligence on the crypto king and she believes they will start offering the product to their customers:
“What has changed is that we are now talking to the major platforms. We call them wirehouses. So Morgan Stanley, UBS, Merrill Lynch, Wells Fargo, and they’re in deep due diligence like, ‘Okay, what is this?’…
And while no major platform has listed any of the spot Bitcoin ETFs on its platform, we think this is coming. We can tell from the types of questions they ask.”
Source: https://cryptobenelux.com/2024/05/31/cathie-wood-discussieert-toekomst-crypto-etfs-op-conferentie/
