Summary of this article:<p>1) Barry Silbert's BIT has beat the Winklevoss' (or Winklevii) bitcoin fund to market by using a backdoor listing technique.<p>2) Finra granted its request for a permanent ticker symbol, GBTC, and that “is expected to be effective shortly.”<p>3) Each share of BIT is worth approximately one-tenth of a bitcoin. As of Friday, the trust’s net asset value stood at $24.43 per share.
Additional Note: Barry Silbert is the founder of SecondMarket.<p>Not sure what they're doing now (website is confusing) but when I interned there in 2012 they were a marketplace for all sorts alternative assets. They became somewhat well known when they made a deal with Facebook to be the exclusive pre-IPO market for Facebook equity. They made a business of helping private companies organize buying/selling of their shares. They branched out into all sorts of things including a gold fund, etc. So this seems like a natural move for Barry.
I wonder if market dynamics will force an artificial increase in the value of bitcoin. If the bitcoin market is operating properly, a bitcoin ETF existing should not increase the price of bitcoins. If it does, can we assume bitcoins are overvalued?<p>In the housing boom people built houses and sold mortgages because they were a good investment, not because people actually needed the houses. If the bitcoin ETFs make speculative buying of bitcoins so easy for the average joe, we could see a huge bitcoin price increase, followed by a crash a while later.
Will be traded on OTC markets? I believe OTC is where most penny stocks are bought and sold, right?<p>So this should be a pretty good gambling opportunity. Wish I knew the exact date this thing launches.
Big news. Sent the price for a big jolt! <a href="https://cryptowat.ch/bitfinex/btcusd/30min" rel="nofollow">https://cryptowat.ch/bitfinex/btcusd/30min</a>
Thanks for these temporary bumps so that I can finally sell my overpriced bitcoins left at a minimal loss, close this page, and move forward to some more meaningful investment strategies.