On April 8, Morgan Stanley became the first Wall Street bank to launch its own Bitcoin-tracking exchange-traded fund under the ticker MSBT.
MSBT debuted on the NYSE Arca and recorded first-day inflows of $30.6 million. reported by Farside Investors ETF Monitor.
Interestingly enough, Senior Bloomberg analyst Eric Balchunas had already predicted these inflows when he went to X and noted:
Morgan Stanley’s MSBT vs. Other Spot BTC ETFs
However, if you look back, compared to other Bitcoin [BTC] ETFs, performance was low.
This is because on January 11, 2024, the launch date of multiple Spot Bitcoin ETFs, Bitwise’s BITB saw inflows worth $237.9, followed by Fidelity’s FBTC, which recorded inflows worth $227.0 million.
Additionally, BlackRock’s IBIT saw inflows worth $111.7 million. In fact, only Invesco’s BTCO, Valkyrie’s BRRR, Wisdom Tree’s BTCW and VanEck’s HOLD were the ones that recorded less inflows than MSBT.
Does MSBT have an edge in this competitive market?
But despite this, and being late on the launch list, the fees and scale give MSBT a secret advantage over others.
With an expense ratio of 14 basis points compared to the 1 basis point of Grayscale’s BTC and the 11 basis points of BlackRock’s IBIT, MSBT is the cheapest fund.
Allyson Wallace, global head of ETFs at Morgan Stanley Investment Management, recently weighed in on this Bloomberg interview said,
Demand, especially from wealthy investors, was quite high. From a corporate level, this is an asset class that will not disappear.
Overall, this shift in sentiment shows how traditional institutional leaders are finally understanding the value of crypto.
Strategy’s new CEO, Phhong Lee, commented on this and recently hit the nail on the head when he said:
In the past month, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab and Citadel – among the largest asset managers, broker-dealers and hedge funds in the world – announced plans to expand Bitcoin’s potential. Probably nothing.
Volatile market dynamics
This comes at a time when the overall crypto market has boomed following the announcement of an immediate ceasefire in the ongoing tensions between the US and Iran. This in turn resulted in the crypto market surging by over 4% on April 8.
However, at the time of writing, the crypto market was back in the hands of sellers and was trading at $2.42 trillion. But despite the drop, Bitcoin was still above the $70.00 mark, changing hands to $71,501.17 at the time of reporting.
Final summary
- Morgan Stanley’s Bitcoin ETF debut wasn’t as strong, but the fees and fees give it an added edge over other Spot BTC ETFs.
- The launch at a time when the crypto market was volatile demonstrates banks’ long-term commitment to Bitcoin.