Bitwise Launches Blue-Chip NFT Index Fund, Offering Broad Exposure to the Most Iconic Digital Art Collections

Bitwise Asset Management, the world’s largest crypto open-end fund manager with over $1.6 billion in AUM,1 today announced the launch of the Bitwise Blue-Chip NFT mutual fund, a technique that provides investors broad exposure to the world’s largest and most-established non-fungible token, or NFT, art collections. By offering access to an oversized cross-section of a brand new market during a familiar format, the Bitwise Blue-Chip NFT open-end investment

company is intended for investors intrigued by the NFT market but without the time or desire to participate in periodic auctions or bid on individual pieces of art.

NFTs, or digital proofs of ownership recorded on decentralized blockchains, have galvanized global art markets in recent months. Individual works from well-known NFT collections like CryptoPunks, Bored Ape gild, and Autoglyphs have sold for several dollars at auction houses and attracted intense media interest. Meanwhile, NFT trading volumes spiked to over $10 billion within the third quarter of 2021.2

“New frontiers in art are rare. Entirely new artistic mediums are even rarer,” said Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan. “NFTs have emerged because the first digitally native medium for owning art and collectibles, with enormous potential for meaning, value, and use in our increasingly digital world. for several investors, that combination spells potential opportunity. The Bitwise Blue-Chip NFT open-end fund seeks to present these investors simple, diversified access to the digital art market’s most respected collections during a meaningful way.”

The fund will seek to trace the Bitwise Blue-Chip NFT Collections Index, a basket of the ten largest NFT collections weighted by market capitalisation,3 with a technique aimed toward optimizing liquidity and price discovery. From its launch, the fund will begin to get and hold in custody NFTs from blue-chip collections with a combined total market capitalisation of quite $6 billion, including CryptoPunks, Bored Ape society, Autoglyphs, Fidenza, VeeFriends, and more.4 Moreover, the fund’s relatively low minimums will give investors the chance to share ownership in digital art to which they may not otherwise have access, particularly given the value, time, and complexity of sourcing and buying individual NFTs.

“Since Bitwise launched the world’s first crypto open-end investment company in 2017, our aim has always been to present investors a wise and convenient thanks to participate in crypto’s growth wherever that leads us,” said Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley. “And recently it’s become clear that any conversation about crypto’s potential must include NFTs, which are fundamentally changing how we expect about not just owning art but property rights normally. having the ability to take a position in a number of the NFT movement’s most defining collections as these evolve is a chance we wanted to create available to people who are as compelled by the space as we are.”

The launch of the Bitwise Blue-Chip NFT mutual fund rounds out a year during which Bitwise has created eight other crypto funds — four of which were index-based, including the Bitwise DeFi mutual fund and therefore the Bitwise “ex Bitcoin” open-end fund. Bitwise partners with investment professionals, today serving many RIAs, financial advisors, multifamily offices, hedge funds, and other institutional investors with a nationwide business development team.

The Bitwise Blue-Chip NFT mutual fund is currently available to accredited investors for personal placement subscription with a $25,000 minimum investment and can provide monthly redemptions after an initial lock-up period.

1 As of November 30, 2021
2 DappRadar, “Q3 Industry Report,” October 1, 2021. Available at: https://dappradar.com/blog/dapp-industry-report-q3-2021-overview
3 Calculated by multiplying the lowest-priced item on offer within the collection by the amount of things within the collection.
4 Data from Bitwise Asset Management