(Bloomberg) — Bitcoin’s decline has been driven in part by sales of Grayscale Bitcoin Trust shares since exchange-traded funds holding the cryptocurrency began trading, SkyBridge Capital founder Anthony Scaramucci said.
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“There seems to be a lot of selling on Grayscale,” Scaramucci said in an interview on Bloomberg TV on Friday.
The hedge fund manager said his trading desk noticed that when the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approved the ETFs this week, holders of the stocks were selling the shares at paper losses and turning to lower-fee alternatives. . The shares were converted from the trust this week.
Zach Pandl, managing director or researcher at Grayscale, said selling one bitcoin product to buy another should not affect the price of bitcoin. The potential approval of a spot Bitcoin ETF has been a topic of discussion since Grayscale’s court victory last summer. He said that given Bitcoin’s valuation, the asset will naturally see some profit-taking.
GBTC has been around since 2013 and saw $2.3 billion in trading volume on Thursday, the largest first-day volume ever for an ETF. It has been one of the most popular channels for gaining exposure to Bitcoin. The original cryptocurrency topped $49,000 on Thursday, hitting a two-year high, before falling below $43,000 on Friday.
GBTC shares fell 5.2% to $38.58 on Friday. Last year, GBTC shares soared more than 300%, while Bitcoin rose nearly 160%.
“The second thing we’re seeing is that the FTX bankruptcy estate is being transferred to ETF announcements. There’s a lot of selling in Bitcoin right now. I expect the oversupply to be resolved in the next six years,” Scaramucci said. To eight trades day. “
FTX, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges, filed for bankruptcy along with a slew of major cryptocurrency companies in the 2022 market crash, but it still holds a large amount of crypto assets and is in the process of liquidation.
“One last thing, Wall Street has gone through a quiet period. Wall Street hasn’t been able to market these ETFs yet, which is also going to start in about eight days,” Scaramucci said.
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