You Won’t Believe What Bitwise Just Unleashed on the London Stock Exchange 🤯

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My dear, stop the presses and fetch the smelling salts! Bitwise, that dashing asset manager with a penchant for all things digital, has sauntered onto the London Stock Exchange with not one, not two, but four (count them, darling) crypto ETPs. Bitcoin and Ether are positively hobnobbing with European financiers now, in a move likely to make old-school bankers reach for the gin.

The spilled martini details: the Bitwise Core Bitcoin ETP, the Bitwise Physical Bitcoin ETP, the mysterious-sounding Physical Ethereum ETP, and, as if that weren’t enough excitement for one afternoon, the Bitwise Ethereum Staking ETP. This was all revealed in an announcement so recent, the ink is still drying—April 16, to be devastatingly precise.

Now, unless you’re the sort who wears a monocle and gets invited to hedge fund galas (in other words, an “accredited investor”), you’ll have to watch the party from behind the velvet rope. No hoi polloi allowed, alas!

Bitwise is positively swooning with ambition, knocking on the doors of “digital investment vehicles” everywhere as crypto continues its transformation from outlaw upstart to begrudgingly-accepted guest at the global finance soirée. The lure for institutional money grows ever stronger, and, apparently, so does crypto’s respectability—heaven help us all!

Bitwise Tackles the Wild West of U.S. Crypto Regulation With Panache

Meanwhile, Stateside, former SEC Chairman Gary Gensler’s resignation seems to have prompted a stampede reminiscent of guests rushing for the last canapé. Asset managers and crypto firms hurled their ETF applications at the agency faster than you can say “regulatory arbitrage.”

Bitwise’s own entry, a genteel ETF mixing both BTC and ETH for the investor who simply can’t decide, was given a genteel “maybe” from the SEC in January. Final approval is still pending—apparently SEC bureaucracy moves slower than a butler carrying vintage port.

If you thought the party would end there, sit down. In March 2025, the NYSE applied to host the Bitwise Dogecoin ETF. That’s right, the first memecoin investment vehicle—Dogecoin is poised to crash the Wall Street ball in a fit of canine-fuelled exuberance. Investors everywhere are no doubt already practicing how to explain “dog-themed social tokens” at their next dinner party.

Lest Aptos feel left out, Bitwise filed for a proper Aptos ETF. No, you won’t get staking rewards, but you can say you’re investing in a “high-throughput layer-1 blockchain,” which should be enough to silence any tedious dinner companion.

Matt Hougan, Bitwise’s CIO, is gazing into his crystal ball and predicting Bitcoin ETFs will hoover up $50 billion in 2025. That’s enough for several very nice yachts, or a single, spectacularly ostentatious one.

Institutional capital, meanwhile, continues to meander into crypto ETFs, acting as a stabilizer for these volatile digital darlings—and, perhaps, smoothing over a few financial hangovers. Whether this brings order or even greater chaos, only time (and a stiff martini) will tell.

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2025-04-16 19:53