Cryptocurrency ETP provider CoinShares has exercised an option to acquire competitor Valkyrie Funds, part of the Valkyrie Investments group.
The agreement was set to expire on March 31, 2024.
Financial terms have not been disclosed.
The deal is pending the completion of legal due diligence, the signing of necessary agreements, and final approval by the company’s board of directors.
The acquisition will enable CoinShares to continue its expansion in the United States and “capitalize on the diminishing fragmentation of the global exchange-traded funds market.”
“The decision […] was a direct result of the SEC’s approval of Valkyrie’s spot Bitcoin ETF,” the press release states.
The product from the acquired company was among those approved alongside BlackRock, Bitwise, Grayscale, Hashdex, BZX, Invesco, VanEck, WisdomTree, Fidelity, and Franklin Templeton.
On its first day, trading volume for the Valkyrie Bitcoin ETF (BRRR) reached 676,500 shares, according to Bloomberg.
In terms of the number of trades (7,310), the instrument ranked eighth.
All told there were 700,000 individual trades today in and out of the 11 spot ETFs. For context, that is double the number of trades for $QQQ (altho it sees much bigger $ volume bc bigger fish use it) So a lot more grassroots action (vs big seed buys) than I expected which is… pic.twitter.com/syUGfjHQpr
— Eric Balchunas (@EricBalchunas) January 11, 2024
In terms of trading volume in dollar terms ($9.37 million), BRRR ranked ninth.
Here’s the #Bitcoin ETF Cointucky Derby data via trading volume on day 1 (more volume will continue for a little while).
Total Volume was over $4.6 Billion with $GBTC about half of it. BlackRock & Fidelity went 1 & 2 absent GBTC. pic.twitter.com/t70MzyQfZW
— James Seyffart (@JSeyff) January 11, 2024
As a result of the deal, CoinShares’ assets under management ($4.5 billion) will increase by $110 million.
This figure corresponds to the combined AUM of the Valkyrie Bitcoin Fund (BRRR), Valkyrie Bitcoin and Ether Strategy ETF (BTF), and Valkyrie Bitcoin Miners ETF (WGMI).
Earlier, during the pre-trading session on January 11, before its Nasdaq debut, the price of BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) exceeded its NAV by 25.6%.
The launch of these instruments triggered a surge in Bitcoin to $49,000.