January 2024 saw the launch of the first Bitcoin-pegged exchange-traded funds, or ETFs. This allowed more everyday investors to add the cryptocurrency to their portfolios, without needing to buy it outright. Michael Sonnenshein, CEO of Grayscale - one of the first Bitcoin ETFs to hit the market - joined TheStreet to discuss how to get involved.
Full Video Transcript Below:
J.D. DURKIN: So for someone who's seen these headlines and they're saying, all right, I want to get involved, where do I start? Walk us through the basics, the essentials, what people need to know. Ticker symbol, all the fun stuff.
MICHAEL SONNENSHEIN: Sure so ticker symbol GBTC. G for grayscale BTC as the abbreviation for Bitcoin GBTC. You'll find it in your brokerage account, retirement account, you name it. I think for a lot of people. And one of the ways that Grayscale has really differentiated itself, growing this market is really through education. There is a knowledge gap with investors. And so if you visit grayscale.com, we've made a wealth of, you know, all kinds of information papers, long form, short form videos available because we want people to be making informed investing decisions. And of course the grayscale team is always happy to help.
J.D. DURKIN: There are 11 of these applications at long last have been approved. As you know, the fee that you have at 1.5% is significantly higher than a lot of your other competitors. And for people that are looking at the space and saying, well, maybe it's not an Ark or a Bitwise, but hey, I got an option like BlackRock out there, a 0.2% What is your argument to people now looking to get in off the sidelines who are looking at the offering you have for GBTC and saying that fees significantly higher than I might get with one of the other 10 options?
MICHAEL SONNENSHEIN: Sure well, there's a couple of things to say about fees. So, number one, we have always committed to investors that when we reach this uplisting, because it was always a matter of when, not a matter of if, that we would reduce fees. And we made good on that promise. We reduced fees by 25% In many ways, all the other issuers coming to market are creating a fee war amongst themselves, right? They're starting from 0. They have no assets, no investor base, no trading volume. And so they themselves were almost creating the market for these new assets. When I think about what sets GBTC apart, though, is that it came to market as the second largest commodity ETF in the world. $28 billion AUM, when it debuted this morning. And so when you think about GBTC's robust trading volumes, the diversified investor base, the track record and the fact that it's being brought and administered by a crypto specialist firm that's been doing this for a decade, it definitely stands apart and is a market leader as compared to some of these products coming to market.
