Morgan Stanley has become the first major Wall Street bank to allow its financial advisors to offer a Bitcoin exchange-traded fund to their clients.
The bank's more than 15,000 financial advisors have been authorized to market the Bitcoin ETF to eligible Morgan Stanley clients starting Aug. 7, 2024.
According to CNBC: report Morgan Stanley's 15,000 financial advisors on Friday said they will be able to offer a spot bitcoin ETF to the bank's electronic clients starting Aug. 7, making the bank the first major Wall Street bank to do so amid growing demand.
According to reports, the US-based asset management giant has allowed two funds, BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) and Fidelity's Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC), to be marketed to clients.
But while Morgan Stanley allows advisers to solicit these ETFs for their clients, they are only available to those who qualify — for example, those with a net worth of at least $1.5 million, who demonstrate an aggressive risk tolerance and who are willing to invest speculatively.
The bank also plans to allow clients to invest in Bitcoin ETFs in taxable brokerage accounts rather than retirement accounts.
Fun fact: Morgan Stanley advisors manage $5.7 trillion in client assets.
And next week, their 15,000 advisors will be able to solicit eligible clients for the BlackRock-Fidelity #BitcoinETF 🚀 pic.twitter.com/QTA0xHvxMo
— Bitcoin Magazine (@BitcoinMagazine) August 2, 2024
Spot Bitcoin ETF Market
IBIT and FTBC are among 11 spot exchange-traded funds approved by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to trade in January 2024. These spot ETFs allow investors to buy and trade shares in instruments that track the market performance of Bitcoin, the world's largest digital asset.
Similar to other spot cryptocurrency ETFs, IBIT and FBTC offer investment vehicles for those looking to gain exposure to Bitcoin through an easily accessible and immediately tradable structure.
U.S. physical Bitcoin ETFs have a combined net asset value of $57.2 billion to date, but data shows cumulative net inflows stood at $17.5 billion as of Friday, Aug. 2.
According to data from SoSoValue, the Spot Bitcoin ETF saw net outflows of over $237 million on August 2, 2024, with Fidelity’s IBIT seeing over $104 million outflow, and Grayscale’s GBTC seeing over $45.9 million outflow.
Meanwhile, BlackRock's IBIT recorded inflows of $42.8 million. Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust (BTC), which began trading on the NYSE Arca this week, saw inflows of over $9.8 million.
