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New Listings – The ETF Industry Has Given Bitcoin a Bedtime and a Carbon Offset

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Today's new listings are a small batch. But they are working hard.


7RCC SPOT BITCOIN AND CARBON CREDIT FUTURES ETF (BTCK, NYSE)

Bitcoin has attracted many descriptions over the years. “Digital gold” is the complimentary one. “Energy consumption of a mid-sized country” is the less complimentary one. The environmental case against Bitcoin is well-documented, vigorously debated, and unlikely to be resolved any time soon.

Into this debate steps the 7RCC Spot Bitcoin and Carbon Credit Futures ETF (BTCK), listed on NYSE, with what might be the most structurally ambitious response to that argument yet filed with a regulator. The fund holds approximately 80% in spot Bitcoin and 20% in carbon credit futures, tied to regulated emissions markets including the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, California's Cap-and-Trade programme, and the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. The investment objective is to track the 7RCC Kaiko Bitcoin Carbon Credit Index, a sentence that exists and contains all of those words in that order.

The fund does not claim that Bitcoin has no environmental footprint. It claims that carbon credits can offset it. Whether you find that a reasonable hedge or an elaborate form of cognitive accounting, the construction is coherent. Someone looked at the world's most controversial energy consumer, concluded that the right response was not avoidance but structural counterbalancing, and built an index around the idea.

I find myself unable to fully dismiss it. I also find myself unable to stop thinking about it. 

Both of these things seem like correct responses.


NICHOLAS BITCOIN AND TREASURIES AFTERDARK ETF (NGHT, NYSE)

This one requires a moment.

The Nicholas Bitcoin and Treasuries AfterDark ETF (NGHT), listed on NYSE, is built around a specific empirical observation: Bitcoin's strongest price action has historically occurred outside US trading hours. The argument goes that when Wall Street is closed and global crypto liquidity takes over, the overnight session is where Bitcoin tends to move most decisively. If that pattern holds, then an investor who wants Bitcoin exposure but is indifferent to the daytime hours might reasonably prefer to hold Bitcoin only when the US markets are closed.

NGHT acts on that premise directly. From 4pm ET, when US markets close, the fund holds Bitcoin-linked instruments. By 9:30am ET, before the opening bell, it has switched into short-term US Treasuries. During the trading day, the fund is effectively in cash. It is Bitcoin with office hours, just inverted.
The research underpinning the strategy reportedly shows substantial outperformance from this approach versus holding Bitcoin continuously. I have no reason to dispute that. What I will note is that “a fund that buys Bitcoin at dinner time and sells it before breakfast, because apparently that is when Bitcoin does its best work” is an investment proposition I could not have predicted existing, and yet here we are.


THOR ADAPTIVERISK DYNAMIC ETF (THMR, NYSE)

Quietly, in the same batch, the Thor AdaptiveRisk Dynamic ETF (THMR) also listed on NYSE.

THMR seeks to manage portfolio risk dynamically. The fund adjusts its market exposure based on prevailing conditions, aiming to reduce drawdowns when the environment warrants it and participate in upside when it does not. It holds equities and uses a systematic approach to determine when to pull back. The objective is straightforward: protect capital first, grow it second.

No leverage. No overnight scheduling. No carbon credit offsets. No celebrity co-branding. Just a fund trying to avoid losing money in a falling market, which is genuinely one of the harder things to do in this industry.

In a batch containing Bitcoin's environmental offset and Bitcoin's circadian rhythm strategy, THMR is the one that simply wants to be careful. I found that unexpectedly restoring.


Bernie Thurston works in ETF data at Ultumus. He reads new listing files so you don't have to. These are observations, not investment advice.

 

Bernie Thurston

Bernie loves data. Fortunately for him, London’s finance industry has been indulgent, providing him lots of benchmark data to play with and enjoy. Bernie’s journey began at Sky, where he designed the first interactive television and helped build a technical-based charity (ctt.org). He then hopped over to finance, and soon found himself at a start-up working on dividends and derivatives. Then, by nature of the fact that finance and technology have rapidly conjoined, he found himself working with Credit Suisse to build an index aggregation and distribution platform. Markit then acquired the start-up and Bernie battled his way up the greasy pole becoming the Managing Director of Markit’s equities division, with responsibility for index, ETF and Dividends. But the siren song of startups called once more. And Bernie was headhunted to rescue a failing index business. Over five years, he helped reverse the fortunes of DeltaOne Solutions, turning into a fighting force. So successful was the turn around that Markit came along and acquired this company as well. But Bernie still loved start-ups. To that end, he founded Ultumus, an ETF and benchmark data company. Ultumus aims to provide the best data in the most timely and consumable manner possible. With clients on both buy and sell side, when something happens in the index or ETF industry, Ultumus is the first to know.

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