More Australians are investing in crypto than in gold and silver as per the new poll that we discuss today in our cryptocurrency news.

The survey of more than 2000 Australian investors found that cryptocurrency is a more popular investment than gold and silver but still has a long way to go before it nears the shares. The poll was conducted on behalf of the BTC markets in February and found that 12.6% of the Aussie investors hold BTC or other cryptocurrencies compared to the 12.1% who hold the metals. On the other hand, the stock market is a preferred option for investors with 63.6% holding shares directly and 28.8% investing in managed funds or exchange-traded funds. The property was also a great investment while 18% said they invested in collectibles.

Australian crypto investors favor ETH and BTC with 83.2% holding BTC and 42% holding ETH, followed by Ripple, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash. The survey shows that about one-third of the crypto investors made their first investment after the COVID-19 induced market crash and the research was backed with a poll revealing that 39% of the respondents found BTC more appealing after the pandemic started.

Despite other cryptocurrencies rallying to a new high in the recent months, More Australians stated that they have no intention of selling their coins with a 31% of them planning to exit after about three years of holding. Of the 49% that are looking to sell or to take profits, one in five investors wants to reinvest. The biggest demographics of Aussie investors were aged between 25-34 following the ones aged between 35-44. Men accounted for 63% of all crypto investors and one in four earned about $100,000 per year.

BTC Markets CEO Caroline Bowler noted that older Australians are also investing in crypto with investors 60+ doubling in number in the past few years to make up to 10% of the client base:

 “In the last 12 months, we have seen a shift from 25-45-year-old males to a much broader age group, particularly early retirees who are interested in diversifying their investment portfolio and are catching up with this fastest-growing asset class.”

The research was in line with other polls like the one in December that found almost one in five Australian adults owned crypto last year.

Source: https://www.dcforecasts.com/bitcoin-news/more-australians-invest-in-crypto-than-in-gold-survey/

The world’s first Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) has seen massive success in its first week. It has now surpassed the 10,000 BTC milestone for the first time as data from Glassnode shows. The on-chain data analytics firm has the ETF at 10,064 BTC at press time.

Canadian firm Purpose Investment Inc. became the first company to launch a Bitcoin ETF in the North American market. The ETF trades under the ticker symbol ‘BTCC’ and is trading at the Toronto Stock Exchange. It was an instant hit, recording close to $400 million on its first day. This ranked it as one of the top five ETF debuts in the North American market.

The great demand for Purpose’ BTC ETF is proof of pent-up demand in the market, the company’s chief investment officer believes. Speaking to Yahoo Finance, Greg Taylor claimed his company has an edge as it’s open to ordinary investors. Other similar products, including Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust, are closed-end, only serving institutional investors. 

He stated, “A lot of people have wanted to get exposure to bitcoin but they haven’t really wanted to go through the hoops of opening up their own accounts or their own wallet to do so or trading some of the other closed-end funds. Having the ETF option I think has always been the holy grail out there and we’re happy to have it trading and we’re seeing some of the results of that pent-up demand.”

Taylor further revealed that the demand for BTCC is spread across jurisdictions. “It’s hard with an ETF to figure out exactly where the inflows are coming from, but we’ve had a lot of people reach out from around the world that want to get access to this product,” he remarked.

First Bitcoin ETF Causing Ripples in the Market

Purpose’s Bitcoin ETF has already started causing ripples in the market, despite being around for just a week. One of the effects has been the cooldown in interest for Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust. For the first time in five years, shares of the Trust traded at a discount.

GBTC shares plunged by 22% yesterday to close the day 3.8% below the value of the Trust’s underlying holdings. The shares have been trading at a premium since its launch in 2013. This premium shot up to 132% in May 2017 at its peak. As recently as mid-2020, this premium was as high as 40%.

Nate Geraci, the president of the advisory firm ETF Store believes this is due to the rise of competing products. He told Bloomberg, “Since the beginning of the year, we’ve seen the launch of multiple competing products. The unpleasant truth for GBTC investors is that competition erodes demand for the product, which can lead to a collapsing premium or even a discount.”

In Canada, the Purpose Bitcoin ETF’s popularity is forcing its rivals to drop their fees to compete. Evolve Funds Group was the second company to launch a Bitcoin ETF, with its product debuting just a day after that of Purpose. However, as Purpose has soared to over $600 million, Evolve Funds is at a mere $28 million. The latter has turned to lower the fees to attract investors.

Evolve lowered the management fee from 1% to 0.75%. Raj Lala, the CEO commented, “We are very pleased to provide investors with the most cost-effective bitcoin ETF today. Our bitcoin ETF allows investors to access physical bitcoin in a fully-regulated manner in their brokerage account.”

Source: https://zycrypto.com/worlds-first-bitcoin-etf-now-holds-more-than-10000-btc/

Bank of Korea chief executive says that bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have no intrinsic value while predicting that the high price fluctuations will remain so let’s see what more he had to say in our latest cryptocurrency news.

The head of the Bank of Korea Lee Ju-yeol said that BTC and other major cryptocurrencies have no intrinsic value but he believes that all assets will continue experiencing major price fluctuations. The Bank of Korea chief executive said that Bitcoin as well as other crytpocurencies, don’t possess inherent value and blasted the volatile nature of the digital asset industry. He commented:

 “There is no intrinsic value in crypto assets.”

The news report quoted lawmakers asking BOK’s chief, whether the recent surge in the price of the coin is temporary:

 “It is very difficult to predict the price, but its price will be extremely volatile.”

The bank executive said that the recent rally in the BTC price followed by other digital assets could be led by multiple factors and among them, is Elon Musk who invested $1.5 billion. He also outlined that the latest price surge could be a continuation of the institutional investors using BTC as a hedge. Ju-yeol outlined that the bank should not purchase bonds issued by the country’s government directly because it will raise worries about fiscal stability and will undermine the central bank’s trust. The primary cryptocurrency’s volatility was causing plenty of troubles for both retail and institutional investors.

This type of asset became a stumbling point for many and caused plenty of hesitations in whether to allocate the funds or not. The BTC price managed to make another surge in the past few months and market an all-time high while a few days ago, it skyrocketed above $58K, bringing other altcoins like ETH with it. Almost immediately after the upgrowth, BTC suffered a strong correction and settled around $50k as per the time of writing. As a result, the crypto market capitalization lost about $300 billion in two days. JPMorgan strategists said that the BTC liquidity will bring more problems as analysts from the US multinational banking institution argued that this benchmark cryptocurrency is in a liquidity shortage and warned investors that it will suffer another drop soon.

Source: https://www.dcforecasts.com/altcoin-news/bank-of-korea-chief-executive-says-crypto-has-no-intrinsic-value/