Just-in: Morgan Stanley Becomes First Major US Bank to Offer Access to Bitcoin Funds

Morgan Stanley, the American Banking giant has become the latest financial institution to start offering a Bitcoin Fund to its institutional clients. The banking giant would offer three funds to its clients to help them gain exposure to Bitcoin, two of these funds on offer are from Galaxy Digital, and the third is a joint effort from asset manager FS Investments and bitcoin company NYDIG.

Morgan Stanley announced on Wednesday in an internal memo sent out to its financial advisors. The banking giant has over $4 trillion worth of assets under its management and its new bitcoin fund would be available to its wealthy clients only.

The firm said their new bitcoin fund would be suitable for people with “an aggressive risk tolerance” who have at least $2 million in assets held by the firm. Investment firms need at least $5 million at the bank to qualify for the new stakes.

Mainstream Financial Giants Rush to Bitcoin

Morgan Stanley’s decision to offer Bitcoin exposure to its wealthy clients does not come as a complete surprise given the growing demand for Bitcoin has forced many traditional giants to either offer direct bitcoin exposure or via investment in firms such as MicroStrategy and Tesla which owns Bitcoin in their treasury.

Before Morgan Stanley’s decision, the oldest custody bank in the US BNY Mellon also started offering Bitcoin exposure to its clients last month. At the start of the bull run, fortune 500 companies such as MicroStrategy and later Tesla was the first to recognize Bitcoin’s potential as the treasury hedging asset, and later traditional banking giants including JP Morgan and now Morgan Stanley have decided to offer Bitcoin fund to its clients amid growing demand.

The fact that JP Morgan only last month claimed that a Bitcoin Fund would be added as per client’s demand and a couple of days back added Bitcoin and crypto funds. This is a clear example of growing Bitcoin demand among institutions which might force many more banking giants to follow in the footsteps of Morgan Stanley.