Brokerdealer.com blog update courtesy of extract from Traders Magazine, the leading publication within securities industry’s sell-side (otherwise known as the universe of registered broker-dealers). Coverage for this story provided by TradersMag writer Gregg Wirth. Visitors to this page who may wish to know more about brokerdealers and institutional investors having an interest in bitcoins are invited to search the brokerdealer.com database.
Bitcoin, the crypto-currency that initially became infamous as the tender of choice for drug traffickers and mercenaries, may be coming to a trading desk or institutional portfolio near you – and sooner than you think.
“2014 is going to be the year Bitcoin hits Wall Street,” said Barry Silbert, founder and CEO of SecondMarket, a capital-raising platform for private companies and investment funds. Indeed, there is a growing consensus in some corners of Wall Street and the buyside community that the $7.8 billion Bitcoin industry is going to become the new, flashy darling of investors, with dedicated digital currency funds, venture capitalists and asset managers all chasing after those 12 million bitcoins currently in circulation.
“Digital currencies like Bitcoin are not going away,” Silbert explained. “And Wall Street and the regulators know this, they’ve studied how to deal with it, and now they are starting to understand its potential.” SecondMarket has gone heavy into the Bitcoin phenomenon, launching the Bitcoin Investment Trust, a $70 million open-ended trust that invests exclusively in bitcoins, as well as a dedicated desk of 10 traders who buy and sell bitcoins for the trust and other institutional clients. SecondMarket is also creating what it hopes to be the largest, best-capitalized and well-run Bitcoin exchange in the U.S., and is enlisting banks and Bitcoin-related firms to be exchange members.
“The number of inquiries and requests from finance industry professionals for us to prepare compliant investor offering documents for crypto-centric funds is certainly keeping us busy”, said Paul Azous, CEO of Prospectus.com. “We don’t see this as some type of anomaly that is connected to a short-term fad, many of the funds we are working with are forward-thinking folks who realize that blockchain applications will be expressed in nearly every business process.”
In addition to preparing investment fund offering documents, Prospectus.com helps blockchain-based startups craft white papers, presentation decks that resonate with accredited investors and through a captive network of crypto industry consultants, the firm guides those advancing Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs).