Goldman Sachs' asset management arm has submitted a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to bring its inaugural cryptocurrency exchange-traded fund to market, according to a document filed on Tuesday. The proposed ETF is structured to give investors exposure to the price movements of bitcoin while also seeking to produce income by engaging in bitcoin options transactions.
The filing was lodged days after rival Morgan Stanley put its spot bitcoin fund, the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust ETF, into the market. Firms are moving into bitcoin products even as the cryptocurrency space confronts a deteriorating risk environment.
Crypto assets have declined in recent months as risk appetite has weakened, driven in part by volatility in precious metals, a broad selloff in technology shares, and the conflict between the United States and Israel with Iran. Those factors have put strain on investor sentiment toward digital assets.
“The addition of (options) income to the product can be nice, but this could be a hard sell, given the volatility and the fact that the product will still leave investors with downside exposure,” said Bryan Armour, an ETF analyst at Morningstar, commenting on the structure Goldman has proposed.
The SEC filing did not specify the fee that Goldman plans to charge for the ETF. The document indicates the product could begin trading as early as the end of June.
Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market value, has fallen nearly 15% so far this year and was quoted at $74,591 in the filing. The token remains approximately 40% below its record high of $126,223 reached in October.
Assets under management for cryptocurrency ETFs continue to expand, but the growth path has been uneven. Data from ETF.com show that the Grayscale Bitcoin Covered Call ETF and the Global X Bitcoin Covered Call ETF each experienced net outflows over the past three months.
A Goldman Sachs Asset Management spokesperson declined to comment on the filing.
The bitcoin ETF proposal is the first filing Goldman has made since completing its roughly $2 billion acquisition of Innovator Capital Management earlier this month. Innovator is known for developing ETFs that use options to shape outcomes or generate income, and the firm introduced the first U.S. buffer ETFs in 2018.
Industry tools and promotional materials referenced within the original filing context also referenced a separate investment research product. That product, ProPicks AI, evaluates Goldman Sachs alongside other companies using a range of financial metrics and highlights past winners such as Super Micro Computer and AppLovin, citing gains of +185% and +157% respectively in prior periods. The materials asked whether a $2,000 investment in Goldman Sachs would be advisable based on the AI's monthly evaluations.
Contextual note: The filing, market figures, quoted commentary, and product details above reflect the information contained in the submitted SEC document and related materials.