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Banking giant Morgan Stanley announced a near-selloff of its Grayscale holdings while liquidating a total of $269.9 million worth of GBTC shares which it held in Q1 2024.
During the second quarter, banking giant Morgan Stanley did a major swap with its Bitcoin ETF portfolio as per the 13F filing submitted to the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, August 14. The 13F filings are basically the reports submitted to the SEC by institutional investment managers having assets under management of at least $100 million. Besides, the filing also provides a view of the managers’ stock holdings.
Similar to banking giant Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley also gained a huge exposure of $190 million to BlackRock Bitcoin ETF IBIT. during the second quarter of this year, Morgan Stanley acquired more than 5.5 million shares of the iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT). This puts the investment bank among the top five holders of IBIT.
Apart from BlackRock, Morgan Stanley also holds 26,222 shares of the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB) valued at $1.57 million. However, it is still down from the $2.3 million allocation shown during the end of the first quarter.
Morgan Stanley Liquidates Its Massive GBTC Holdings
Banking giant Morgan Stanley announced a near-selloff of its Grayscale holdings while liquidating a total of $269.9 million worth of GBTC shares which it held in Q1 2024. As a result, the company has a very minor exposure to GBTC around $148,000.
Since its inception in January, there have been massive outflows from GBTC owing to its high management fee of 2.5%, which is nearly 10 times that of its competitors. On the other hand, inflows into BlackRock’s IBIT have surged past $20 billion making it one of the top Bitcoin ETFs in AUM. Below is the list of the largest holders of BlackRock’s IBIT with Goldman Sachs coming second after Capula management.
Who bought the most IBIT this quarter pic.twitter.com/PoEzPlyF7g
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 15, 2024
On Wednesday, August 14, the US Bitcoin ETFs registered total outflows of $81.4 billion with Grayscale‘s GBTC alone contributing to more than $56 million in outflows. Besides, Fidelity‘s FBTC also recorded $18 million worth of outflows.
Moreover, the Bitcoin price has also come under selling pressure falling 4.35% and now trading around $58,130 levels. This happens despite the US CPI data showing signs of cooling inflation. On the other hand, Defiance is planning to launch a 1.75x long MicroStrategy ETF.
