The investment management company, Grayscale, has reported that it continues to advance in the creation of trusts backed by digital assets. In a statement, the company announced the creation and public launch of two new investment trusts in cryptocurrencies NEAR Protocol (NEAR) and Stacks (STX). The initiative tries to respond – according to the company – to the demands of its clients, who are looking for exposure to a variety of cryptocurrencies. With the bull market underway, more and more investors are seeing interest in gaining exposure to the volatility of bitcoin (BTC) and other digital assets. Many prefer to do so, not directly, but through regulated investment platforms. “By creating distinctive solutions to address scalability challenges in the Stacks and Near networks they are poised to help foster greater adoption and ultimately help drive the cryptocurrency ecosystem,” said the head of product and Grayscale research, Rayhaneh Sharif-Askary. The company explains that These new funds follow the same structure and administration as other similar products by Grayscale. In these funds, anyone who meets the eligibility requirements can invest at any time they prefer. For now, this announcement has not benefited the price of either of the two assets. In the case of NEAR, which is the cryptocurrency of a layer 1 network designed as a community-managed cloud computing platform, it is down. In the last 24 hours NEAR price fell by 4% and its price is $7.6, as seen in the TradingView chart below.
NEAR price with 1 hour candles. Source: TradingView A similar situation presents STX, the Stacks cryptocurrency, a second layer network on top of Bitcoin. This asset has fallen 2% in the last 24 hours. Its price today is $1.95.
STX price with 1 hour candles. Source: TradingView.
Grayscale launches funds as it waits for its Ethereum ETF
While Grayscale launches these funds (which are listed on secondary markets) is awaiting possible approval of its ether spot ETF, Ethereum (ETH) cryptocurrency, as reported by BitcoinDynamic. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) must make a final decision today, May 23, on an ether-based fund proposed by the company VanEck. However, I could give the green light to all the proposals at the same time, just as it did with bitcoin (BTC) ETFs. In that attempt to comply with regulatory requirements, Grayscale modified its 19b-4 application, with the aim of eliminating provisions on staking. This step was also taken by other requesting companies such as BlackRock and Bitwise.