Written by: Nian Qing, ChainCatcher
Following the recent May 15 deadline for filing first quarter 13F reports with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, a total of approximately 1,000 institutions hold approximately $11.55 billion in Bitcoin spot ETFs.
Institutional investment levels in Bitcoin ETFs vary. Among them, 18 institutions hold more than $100 million in related assets, 102 institutions hold more than $10 million in related assets, and 371 institutions hold more than $1 million in related assets. The BTC ETF assets held by most institutions only account for a small portion of their total asset management scale.
Most of the 18 institutions holding related assets exceeding US$100 million are well-known hedge funds and asset management companies, such as Millennium Management, Jane Street Group, Schonfeld Strategic Advisors, etc. Similarly, large institutions' investment in crypto assets only accounts for a small part of their total asset management scale.
In addition, although the 13F filing has become an important indicator in the investment community, these institutions holding spot Bitcoin ETFs does not mean that they are bullish on Bitcoin. For high-frequency trading, cryptocurrency is just a volatile asset. Most institutions purchase Bitcoin for speculative trading strategies and do not fully recognize any fundamental value of Bitcoin. Does this mean that after the United States officially passed the BTC spot ETF in January this year, the market still lacks long-term holders of Bitcoin?
But in general, as of the first quarter, the assets of spot BTC ETFs exceeded $11 billion, making it the most successful ETF issuance in history. BTC ETFs have promoted Bitcoin to a recognized financial asset and opened up a way for professional investors, hedge funds, family offices and institutions to participate in Bitcoin investment. Institutional interest in BTC ETFs is growing.
About 13F Files
The full name of 13F is SEC Form 13F. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) stipulates that investment institutions or consultants with assets under management exceeding US$100 million must submit quarterly reports within 45 days after the end of each quarter, disclosing their common stocks (including ETFs), options, American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), convertible bonds, etc., and provide detailed descriptions based on the type of securities, stock name and quantity, total market value, etc.
The 13F filing of an institution should be submitted to the SEC within 45 days after the end of the calendar quarter, usually before February 15, May 15, August 15, and November 15 each year (if it falls on a holiday, the deadline is the next business day). After the report is submitted, it will be made public on the SEC's database (EDGAR). Most institutions will wait until the last minute to submit in order to conceal their investment strategies from competitors. The data of the Q2 13-F filing is more worthy of attention in the crypto market, and ChainCatcher will continue to pay attention.
In this article, ChainCatcher compiled a complete list of institutions in descending order of investment amount based on the list of BTC ETF holders in the 13F filing released by ccn.com. Let’s first take a look at the top ten institutions holding the most spot BTC ETFs:
The top ten institutions holding the most spot BTC ETFs
1. Millennium Management
Keywords: hedge funds
Millennium Management is a global investment firm founded by Israel Englander in 1989. The firm is known for its multi-strategy hedge funds. As of the first quarter of this year, Millennium invested about $2 billion in several ETFs, including BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT.O), Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, and funds launched by issuers such as Bitwise Investments and ARK Investment Management. The total assets in Q1 were $234 billion, and its crypto investments accounted for less than one percent.
2. Susquehanna International Group (SIG)
Keywords: market maker, asset management, venture capital fund
SIG was founded in 1987. Its business scope covers securities investment, trading, financial services, etc. Its most well-known expertise is the pricing and trading of financial derivatives (especially stock options). It is also the "designated market maker" for approximately 600 stock options and 45 stock index options in the Chicago Board Options Exchange, the American Stock Exchange, the Philadelphia Stock Exchange, and the International Stock Exchange, responsible for major stocks including Google, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, General Electric, PepsiCo, Microsoft, etc. Susquehanna Asia owns approximately 15% of ByteDance's shares.
Although SIG invested $1.326 billion in the BTC ETF, the investment only accounts for a small part of its portfolio. The company's assets under management were $576 billion at the end of the first quarter, and crypto investments accounted for only 0.02% of it.
3. Horizon Kinetics Asset Management
Keywords: hedge funds, asset management
Horizontal Dynamics Ltd. was established in May 2011 through the merger of Horizon Asset Management Ltd., which was established in 1994, and Dynamics Asset Management Ltd., which was established in 1996. As early as 2016, Horizontal Dynamics allocated 1% of its shares to invest in the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust Fund. In 2020, its holdings of the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ranked fifth. The company also issued a "Blockchain Development ETF" that mainly invests in equity securities, American depositary receipts and global depositary receipts of listed blockchain development companies.
The company had $5.3 billion in assets under management at the end of the first quarter, with $946 million invested in BTC ETFs accounting for 17.8%.
4. Jane Street Group
Keywords: hedge funds, market makers
Jane Street is a quantitative trading company and liquidity provider. SBF and other founders of the crypto community all come from Jane Street. Although Jane Street announced the reduction of its crypto business when the US policy tightened after the FTX incident in May last year, it has actually been providing market making for the crypto industry. Jane Street Capital is still investing in the crypto field. In addition, Jane Street is also an authorized dealer of Bitcoin spot ETFs designated by Grayscale, Fidelity, and WisdomTree.
The company had $478 billion in assets under management at the end of the first quarter, and the $634 million invested in the BTC ETF accounted for only one thousandth of that.
5. Schonfeld Strategic Advisors
Keywords: hedge funds
Schonfeld Strategy Advisors is a New York-based hedge fund founded in 2015. The predecessor of Schonfeld's consulting business was the family office run by Mr. Steven Schonfeld. Schonfeld invested $248 million in IBIT and $231.8 million in FBTC in the first quarter, totaling $479 million.
The firm had $15 billion in assets under management at the end of the first quarter, with $480 million invested in the BTC ETF accounting for 3.2%.
6. Bracebridge Capital
Keywords: hedge funds
Bracebridge Capital is a hedge fund headquartered in Boston, USA. Founded in 1994, it manages the funds of Yale University and Princeton University endowment funds.
Bracebridge Capital has bought a large number of Bitcoin spot ETFs this year, including $300 million of Ark 21Shares' ARKB and $100 million of BlackRock's IBIT, as well as $26.52 million of Grayscale GBTC, accounting for 86% of its total assets. The ARKB it bought accounted for 9.94% of the total outstanding shares, even higher than the 6.68% held by Ark itself.
7. Boothbay Fund Management
Keywords: hedge funds
Boothbay Fund Management is an institutional investment firm based in New York City. It was founded in late 2011 and is run by renowned fund manager Ari Glass. It manages two global multi-strategy multi-manager funds. Boothbay Fund Management has been investing in cryptocurrencies since 2013.
Boothbay Fund Management disclosed $377 million in spot BTC ETF investments, including $149.8 million in IBIT, $105.5 million in FBTC, $69.5 million in GBTC, and $52.3 million in BITB. Its Q1 AUM was $5.2 billion.
8. Morgan Stanley
Keywords: hedge funds, asset management
Morgan Stanley is an international financial services company founded in New York, USA, providing financial services including securities, asset management, corporate mergers and reorganizations, and credit cards. As of March 31, Morgan Stanley held nearly $270 million in GBTC. It opened the configuration of the relevant ETF to customers shortly after the BTC spot ETF was approved in January, so the relevant investment is likely to be made on behalf of customers, rather than the bank's own bet on Bitcoin.
Its asset management scale in Q1 reached 1.2 trillion US dollars, and crypto investment accounted for a very small proportion.
9. ARK Investment Management
Keywords: investment fund, asset management
ARK Invest is an asset management company headquartered in New York, USA, founded by Cathie Wood Wood in 2014. In Q1, the asset size was approximately US$14 billion, and the stocks with the largest holdings were COIN (Coinbase) and TSLA (Tesla).
In January this year, 21Shares and ARK Invest officially launched the Bitcoin spot ETF. Shortly after the relevant ETF was issued, ARK Next Generation Internet ETF, one of Ark Investment's ETF products, sold its $16 million position in the Bitcoin futures ETF-ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF to purchase 365,427 shares of ARK 21 Shares Bitcoin ETF issued by Ark Investment. After buying this ETF, ARK 21 Shares Bitcoin ETF currently accounts for about 1% of ARKW's total position.
10. Pine Ridge Advisers
Keywords: Investment advisor
Pine Ridge Advisers is an American investment advisory company founded in 2014. The current asset management scale is US$855 million. The company owns US$205 million in IBIT, FBTC and BITB, accounting for 23% of its total management scale. According to analysts, Pine Ridge Advisers may be motivated by arbitrage trading considerations, rather than allocating 1/4 of the client's portfolio to Bitcoin like some investment advisors do.
List of Spot BTC ETF Buyers (Investment Amount Exceeding USD 1 Million)
