On May 6, the financial services company Robinhood announced the firm has listed Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) and Ethereum Trust (ETHE). Robinhood customers can now gain access the crypto investment products in order to get exposure to bitcoin or ethereum without actually owning the digital currencies.
In Addition to Cryptos, Robinhood Adds Grayscale’s GBTC and ETHE
This week Robinhood added GBTC and ETHE to the company’s platform and the firm’s brokerage account customers can now buy or sell GBTC and ETHE stock and options commission-free.
Robinhood adding GBTC and ETHE investment products follows the firm rolling out its crypto wallet during the first week of April. On April 12, 2022, Robinhood listed shiba inu (SHIB), compound (COMP), polygon (MATIC), and solana (SOL).
The founder and CEO of Digital Currency Group (DCG), the parent company of Grayscale Investments, Barry Silbert, was thrilled to see Robinhood list GBTC and ETHE. “Finally,” Silbert tweeted. “You can now trade Grayscale Bitcoin Trust and Grayscale Ethereum Trust on Robinhood.”
Year-to-date statistics show GBTC is down 46.63% and ETHE is down 44.08%. Grayscale recently filed a Form 10 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a Zcash Trust, Stellar Lumens Trust, and Horizen Trust.
Grayscale is also in the midst of trying to get its trust converted into an exchange-traded fund (ETF). However, the SEC has been an obstacle for bitcoin spot ETFs to emerge and the U.S. regulator has yet to approve a bitcoin spot ETF.
Grayscale Investments’ CEO Michael Sonnenshein recently explained in an interview that the SEC could possibly violate the Administrative Procedure Act if a bitcoin spot ETF is completely denied.
The firm’s chief legal officer, Craig Salm, described what the conversion process would look like if the trust became an ETF. “GBTC share prices will likely move to trade in line with NAV,” Salm detailed. “Then, the shares would be uplisted from OTCQX to NYSE Arca,” the chief legal officer added.
Grayscale Investments is also asking people to get involved with the effort to get the U.S. regulator to approve the conversion of GBTC to an ETF.
Prior to adding Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust and Ethereum Trust, Robinhood started its European expansion and recently acquired the UK crypto company Ziglu. Additionally, last month the co-founder and CEO of Robinhood, Vladimir Tenev, discussed how DOGE could scale with Tesla’s Elon Musk.
