This investment management firm that historically invests in gold is now opening its portfolio to Bitcoin. The cryptosphere is applauding, but the news doesn’t necessarily delight this yellow metal lover who simply can’t see Bitcoin in paint.
Bitcoin as common stock
According to an SEC filing released on August 30, 2021, investment firm U.S. Global Investors has added more than $566,000 in Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) shares in 3 of its 8 mutual funds: $302,899 in the Gold and Precious Metals Fund, $222,532 in the World Precious Minerals Fund, and $40,958 in the Global Resources Fund.
U.S. Global Investors is certainly making a move into Bitcoin, but the amount invested is nothing extraordinary at this point. This Bitcoin exposure represents only about 0.19% of the net assets of the Gold and Precious Metals Fund and the World Precious Minerals Fund. The SEC filing indicates that U.S. Global Investors considers GBTC to be a common stock.
Merging digital gold with physical gold
US Global Investors usually invests in minerals, oil, various natural resources, and especially precious metals like gold. The news may have come as a pleasant surprise to the cryptosphere, but it also caused Euro Pacific Capital CEO Peter Schiff, well known for his anti-Bitcoin stance and love for gold, to react.
Schiff responded to MascroScope’s tweet informing of the news by stating that:
“Frank Holmes, the CEO of U.S. Global Investors is also the CEO of Hive Blockchain. He has been very active in the crypto space since 2017. So this is not a surprise”.
He added that this exposure “also does not indicate a change in how other #gold equity managers view cryptos or #Bitcoin.”
HIVE is a publicly traded cryptocurrency mining company based in Vancouver, Canada. US Global Investors invested in HIVE in 2017, purchasing 17 million shares of the company. Holmes was then appointed at the time, non-executive chairman of HIVE’s board of directors.
Notwithstanding Peter Schiff, Bitcoin seems to be becoming a must-have for traditional finance investment firms that are starting to open their doors to it. Even U.S. banking giant Citigroup, which has nearly $1,795.1 billion in assets under management, is reportedly about to give in to customer demand, and is considering trading Bitcoin futures.
