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

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 Thurston is the founder and CEO of Ultumus, a leading provider of ETF and index data, calculation, and workflow solutions. With over 20 years of experience in financial technology, Bernie has been at the forefront of index and ETF innovation since 2003. His finance career began at Markit, where as Managing Director for Equities he designed and developed products for index and ETF composition and dividend forecasting from 2003 to 2011. He then founded and led DeltaOne Solutions as Managing Director, building it into a global provider of index and ETF trading data and technology services. The company managed over 100,000 multi-asset class products before being acquired by Markit in 2015. Following the acquisition, while working for an ETF issuer, Bernie identified fundamental issues in how index and ETF data was represented across the industry. This led him to found Ultumus in 2016, building solutions for ETF primary market operations. Under his leadership, Ultumus has grown into a market leader serving major financial institutions globally, with its ETF Order Management System (OMS) supporting create and redeem workflows worldwide and its PCF platform calculating and distributing portfolio composition files for ETF issuers across every major market. Bernie sold Ultumus to SIX Group in 2021, where it continues to expand across Europe, North America, and Asia-Pacific. Known for building lasting teams and leveraging cutting-edge technology, Bernie is focused on establishing Ultumus as the backbone of the global index and ETF industry through standardisation and automation.

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