Italy’s State-Owned Bank Trials Digital Bonds on Polygon Blockchain
The European Central Bank initiated the trial to explore how blockchains can enhance central bank settlement.
Cryptocurrency investment firm Grayscale is set to reach 500,000 Bitcoin in its Bitcoin Trust by the end of the month.
This time last week, the firm saw an all-time-high volume of Bitcoin flow into its assets under management (AUM). Adding $215 million USD worth of Bitcoin (which was 5,907 Bitcoin) to its investment, it took its holding to a record $6.7 billion USD which translates to around 481,711 Bitcoin. As it stands, the monthly growth rate of the firm’s cryptocurrency holdings is around 32,000 Bitcoin. If this figure is maintained, the firm is set to hold 500,000 Bitcoin tokens with the next three weeks and 926,600 Bitcoin by the end of the year. Should this happen, the firm would hold control of a whopping 5% of all Bitcoin in current supply.
Grayscale’s Bitcoin investment growth
Congrats again to @Grayscale @BarrySilbert for continuing to ramp private placements into $GBTC. Largest weekly inflow ever $214M. Notice the drop in bitcoins purchased since the price has gone up, this is expected and normal. pic.twitter.com/VpphL0jNPO
— Grain of Salt (@Z06Z07) November 2, 2020
As pointed out by data compiled by Grain of Sand, the firm has seen tremendous growth this year. The AUM has surged from just under $2 billion USD to over $4.7 billion USD in just nine months. The firm launched in 2013 but almost 70% of its holdings have come in during the course of 2020. Over the past three quarters, the Bitcoin Trust weekly inflow increased from a yearly average of $39.5 million USD to more than $55 million USD.
Bullish adoption could mark a positive rally for Bitcoin
With nearly 84% of Grayscale’s Bitcoin additions attributed to institutional investors, there seems to be a massive move towards Bitcoin as a new interest for large-scale institutions. Not only do the figures suggest this, but statistics back it up too. Grayscale published a Bitcoin Investor Study last week, which found that U.S. investors curious about investing in Bitcoin had increased from 36% last year to 55% this year.