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European asset manager CoinShares exercised its option to acquire Valkyrie Funds, the portion of the Nashville-based Valkyrie Investments that yesterday launched a spot Bitcoin ETF.
CoinShares announced it had acquired the option to buy the U.S. ETF business in November, noting that the deal would include the company's Bitcoin ETF: the Valkyrie Bitcoin Fund, which trades on Nasdaq under the BRRR ticker.
As part of the original agreement, the two companies had finalized brand licensing that would allow Valkyrie Investments to use the "CoinShares" name in its S-1 filings with the SEC during the option period. The announcement doesn't mention whether CoinShares has decided to rebrand the Valkyrie Bitcoin ETF and two other funds that are part of the deal.
"At this stage of transition, CoinShares is thoroughly evaluating the most beneficial approach for the business regarding the naming of the funds, including The Valkyrie Bitcoin Fund (BRRR), The Valkyrie Bitcoin and Ether Strategy ETF (BTF), and The Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI)," a spokesperson told Decrypt. "Our objective is to fully integrate Valkyrie into the CoinShares group, and part of this process involves ensuring brand consistency across our product portfolio."
Valkyrie's Bitcoin ETF application was still pending when CoinShares signaled its interest in an acquisition. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission only just approved BRRR and the other Bitcoin funds for trading on Wednesday.
On its first day of trading, BRRR closed at $13.29 and was down slightly, 1.8%, right after the bell on Friday morning.
CoinShares, which has $4.5 billion assets under management, is based on the island Jersey off the coast of France and is the leading European investment company specializing in digital assets. With its acquisition of Valkyrie Funds, CoinShares will bring $110 million worth of assets under its control with BRRR, the Valkyrie Bitcoin and Ether Strategy ETF (Nasdaq: BTF), and the Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (Nasdaq: WGMI).
"Our expertise has enabled us to dominate the European market, commanding over 40% of all assets under management in crypto ETPs," CoinShares CEO Jean-Marie Mognetti said in a press release. "Exercising our option to acquire Valkyrie Funds aims at extending our European success in the U.S, offering unparalleled access to regulated digital asset products to American investors."
So far, it looks like CoinShares will have its work cut out for it. On its first day of trading, BRRR did nearly $9 million worth of volume. That's roughly 0.2% of the $4.5 billion that all 10 spot Bitcoin ETFs accounted for on their debut. The bulk of the trading was on BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), the Fidelity Wise Original Bitcoin Trust (FBTC), and the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC).
Editor's note: This article was updated to add an additional comment from CoinShares.
Edited by Andrew Hayward