Ethereum protocols account for over a third of Grayscale’s assets under consideration for listing as exchange-traded products.
Want to buy decentralized finance (DeFi) exposure from your stock broker? Grayscale may be on the cusp of making it a reality.
In a press release today the issuer of popular exchange-traded products such as Bitcoin-backed GBTC announced a list of new assets under consideration — and over a third come from Ethereum’s DeFi ecosystem.
Aave, Compound, MakerDAO, Reserve Rights, Sushiswap, Synthetix, Uniswap, and Yearn.Finance joined increasingly popular layer-1 chains such as Polkadot, Cosmos, and Cardano on the list — a sign that the “great repricing” may be picking up steam.
“We’re eager to expand our product offerings to better serve our investors,” said Grayscale CEO Michael Sonnenshein in the release. “The digital currency universe is constantly evolving and we seek to identify bold, interesting, and innovative opportunities that satisfy our investors’ demand for differentiated exposure to this burgeoning asset class.”
The announcement also noted that considerations such as “sufficiently secure custody arrangements, and regulatory considerations” will be factors in deciding which assets will go to market as exchange-tradable products — factors that could potentially slow DeFi’s debut on the stock market compared to some of the layer-1s and other projects listed.
Grayscale has previously been criticized for their asset choices, including Bitcoin Cash, a fork of Bitcoin, and Ripple’s XRP.
The selections the investment manager makes come with particular heft, given the importance of products like GBTC and ETHE to institutional and retail investors. Grayscale’s products are often the preferred choice for large buyers seeking crypto exposure via traditional investment rails, and the “investment premium” for their products — the price per share verses the price of the underlying assets — is closely watched.
