ETFS/Cosmos launch Australia’s first bitcoin ETFs
Australia is about to get its first bitcoin and ethereum ETFs after the country’s clearinghouse, ASX Clear, approved the launches last week.
The clearinghouse’s approval has triggered a race between ETF Securities, a locally-owned ETF provider, and Cosmos Asset Management, an arm of the Nasdaq-listed bitcoin miner Mawson Infrastructure, to launch first.
The two have broken out ahead of other ETF providers as they have decided to launch their funds on Cboe Australia, the competitor exchange to the incumbent ASX.
The race is focussed on bitcoin, as both Cosmos and ETFS are launching bitcoin ETFs. Only ETFS is launching an ethereum one.
Both Cosmos and ETFS have brought on partners to help speed up their launches. Cosmos for its part has built its ETF as a feeder fund, that buys the Canadian bitcoin ETF by Purpose. Meaning Purpose will handle the bitcoin.
ETF Securities is working with 21Shares to launch theirs. 21Shares is providing operations support to ETF Securities. The ETFS’ product is not a feeder fund like Cosmos’s.
Other local ETF issuers Monochrome Asset Management, VanEck, and BetaShares are also launching bitcoin and ethereum ETFs in Australia. However, they have opted to launch on the more established exchange, the ASX.
It will be interesting to see if Australia, like Canada, has an experience where the first bitcoin ETFs to launch gather most of the assets. Or if it will be more like Europe, where later arrivals were able to grab big chunks of the market too.
As always i have given up trying to get relevant images for crypto launches as there are just to many...
