Coinbase is reportedly in the process of acquiring the asset management company Osprey Funds.
The indiscretion was made public yesterday by CoinDesk that cites anonymous sources “aware of the agreement” between the two companies.
High-level, but still informal, talks between the company listed in mid-April and the fund manager are said to be taking place at the moment.
Osprey launched its Bitcoin Trust in February, and recently also launched one specializing in Polkadot, for which Coinbase is the custodian.
Osprey Funds is similar to Grayscale, albeit much smaller in size, and Coinbase may be interested in entering this business.
After the IPO, the company may have been able to raise capital to reinvest, and the purchase of a fund manager like Osprey Funds could allow the company to land in this very successful new sector.
Indeed, Grayscale’s numbers are staggering, not least because although its Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) has been around since 2013, the boom only began last year.
In other words, in just one year, 2020, it went from being a small bitcoin investment trust to becoming one of the world’s largest BTC holders.
Why is Coinbase interested in Osprey Funds?
As such, Coinbase’s interest in Osprey Funds is fully justified, not least because in the absence of a bitcoin ETF in the US market, funds like GBTC can be a good alternative.
It is also worth mentioning that Coinbase has been more than just a cryptocurrency exchange for quite some time now, offering many other services that are often dedicated to large investors.
For example, Tesla’s famous purchase of bitcoin was made through Coinbase, as were numerous purchases by MicroStrategy.
In other words, the American company seems to want to play a leading role in this market in the United States, thus having the need to expand in areas adjacent to the current one, such as funds that allow exposure to the price of bitcoin without having to buy BTC directly. Furthermore, funds such as Osprey’s are regulated, making them suitable for high-level institutional investors.
