All too often, as Shakespeare wrote, sound and fury signifies nothing. But the frenzied reaction to the US Securities & Exchange Commission’s (SEC) approval of the sale of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) last week matched the significance of the occasion.
After a decade-long wait, US investors are now able to gain exposure to the digital currency Bitcoin through ETFs (investment funds that track the performance of underlying assets) without having to directly buy it on a cryptocurrency exchange. That the 11 firms granted SEC approval to offer 11 Bitcoin ETFs included US asset management heavyweights BlackRock, Fidelity Investments and Franklin Templeton demonstrated how the gap between traditional and digital asset markets will be significantly diminished by this development.
