News: Vanguard, the American investment advisor, has chosen not to offer spot Bitcoin ETFs, defining BTC as too speculative an asset.
Its CEO Tim Buckley sees Bitcoin as unsuitable for a long-term investment portfolio.
Summary
News: Vanguard’s choice not to offer Bitcoin ETFs for fear of speculation
Vanguard, American investment consultant, has decided not to offer Bitcoin spot ETFs to its investors, defining BTC as too speculative an asset.
Specifically, its CEO, Tim Buckley, described in a discussion that bitcoin is unsuitable to be included in long-term investment portfolios. Here are his words:
“We will not change our mind on this topic. Unless the asset class changes… First of all, we do not believe that [a bitcoin ETF] fits into a long-term portfolio. Someone saving for retirement. It is a speculative asset”
Always Buckley then added:
“We talked about actions, about buying a company’s future earnings [..] bitcoin does not qualify as a reliable “store of value”. It has not served as such and is characterized by extreme volatility. Stocks have been hit by recent crises and bitcoin has followed suit. It is therefore a speculative asset and it is difficult to understand what its role is in the long-term portfolio”.
Bitcoin ETF news: Vanguard’s perspective remains against BTC
Vanguard’s perspective is therefore not as flexible as the decision of the US Securities and Exchange Commission with its approval of Bitcoin spot ETFs.
Actually, it seems that their stance is precisely not wanting to change their mind on the topic of BTC.
Not only that, Buckley prefers to echo the sentiments expressed earlier by the global head of ETF Capital Markets and Broker and Index Relations, who defined bitcoin as an “immature asset class”.
It was the beginning of January 2024, when on the platform dedicated to investments for Vanguard’s clients the new ETFs on Bitcoin spot were listed, but could not be purchased.
For example, the GBTC (Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF) has been made only sellable on Vanguard, and no longer purchasable as before.
Not by chance, GBTC is Grayscale’s ETF on Bitcoin, listed on NYSE Arca, but previously it already existed as a tradable OTC trust. Therefore, while the shares of the previous tradable OTC trust were purchasable on Vanguard’s platform, those of the new ETF are not.
BTC in dump of -5% and positive price forecasts
The current price of Bitcoin (BTC) is down by -5% compared to seven days ago. In fact, at the time of writing, BTC is worth $67,900, compared to $71,700 last week.
Bitcoin seems to be experiencing a price retracement, despite reaching a new all-time high of over $73,000 on March 13th.
Nevertheless, there are those who remain optimistic, like the analysts at Alliance Bernstein who predict that the price of BTC will reach around $150,000 within the next year.
