Wealth and financial advisors oversee trillions of dollars in assets.
While a wide range of financial services, from trading firms to exchanges to hedge funds, have warmed up to the crypto market, wealth and financial advisors have largely remained on the sidelines.
During the latest episode of The Scoop, Michael Batnick, director of research at Ritholtz Wealth Management, and Jeremy Schwartz, EVP and global chief investment officer at Wisdom Tree Asset Management, walked listeners through the RWM WisdomTree Crypto Index and the state of crypto wealth management today.
Ritholtz Wealth Management and Wisdom Tree Asset Management recently announced the launch of a new diversified crypto index for financial advisors in December 2021. Through a partnership with Onramp Invest, the index can be offered by financial advisors via separately managed accounts (SMAs).
"The US regulators still can't get their heads wrapped around a bitcoin spot ETF, which we think is the best structure for a 100 percent allocation," noted Wisdom Tree's Jeremy Schwartz.
In Batnick's view, the crypto market hasn't done a good job marketing itself to advisors.
A report released earlier this year by asset management firm Bitwise suggests that 16% of financial advisors have allocated to crypto in their clients' accounts — an increase from 9% in 2021.
Batnick suspects that number might be far lower.
"An informal survey, I'd say we're under 1 percent," he contended. "The reason why is because I think that the products that were available to financial advisers have not been suitable or at least had difficulties getting advisers comfortable wrapping their arms around the solution."
Episode 10 of Season 4 of The Scoop was recorded remotely with The Block’s Frank Chaparro and Michael Batnick, Director of Research at Ritholtz Wealth Management and Jeremy Schwartz, EVP & Global Chief Investment Officer at Wisdom Tree Asset Management.
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