The firm plans to add a Dogecoin option its current lineup of spot Bitcoin and Ethereum exchange traded funds (ETFs)
Asset management firm Grayscale gave TradFi investors risk-reduced exposure to crypto’s original meme coin last week when it launched its new Dogecoin Trust.
Best known in crypto circles for its spot Bitcoin and Ethereum exchange traded funds (ETFs), the firm said it believes the meme coin’s USD 49.7 billion market cap means its days as a joke coin are behind it.
Grayscale said in a press release that DOGE has transformed itself from a pop culture send-up to a ‘new instrument that can enhance financial inclusion, supporting grassroots political activism while also offering a viable new form of payment.’
On the same day, Grayscale also asked the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to convert the Trust into a spot ETF. That mimics the approvals process it followed for its BTC and ETH products, which both began life as private placements before being converted into ETFs.
As a pro-crypto SEC leadership gets bedded-in under the new Trump administration, a number of asset managers have filed applications for spot ETFs beyond the big two, including those tracing altcoins like XRP and Litecoin.
‘Because it operates as a faster, more scalable, and lower-fee derivative of Bitcoin, Dogecoin offers people and organizations that have been underserved by traditional banking and finance a chance to fully take part in the financial system,’ Grayscale said in a statement.
Twelve months ago, the idea that a spot ETF based on DOGE price movements could be seen as a viable financial product would have seemed far-fetched. Two days after Grayscale’s filing, asset manager Bitwise made its own application for a Dogecoin ETF.
Trump effect spills into crypto markets
Surging digital asset inflows last November (Nov 2024) kicked off a new period of crypto mania.
A report from European asset manager CoinShares on Tuesday said that assets under management for crypto investment vehicles had hit a new all-time high of USD 138 billion. The high-water mark was reached last week when crypto traders and institutional investors poured USD 2.2 billion into crypto funds.
CoinShares maintains a global crypto fund tracker focused on instruments that give investors indirect exposure to digital coins and tokens like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana, particularly spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs).
‘The sudden surge in inflows looks to be sparked by a blend of loosening monetary policy and Donald Trump’s resounding victory in the recent US presidential election,’ CoinShares’ report said.
The firm’s analysts wrote that most of the money found its way into US-listed spot ETFs, giving both sophisticated and retail investors exposure to cryptocurrency price movements.