Hong Kong’s six new spot bitcoin and ether exchange-traded funds recorded over HK$87.5 million ($11.2 million) in trading volume on their first trading day on Tuesday — a figure that pales in comparison to the $4.6 billion first-day volume for the 11 spot bitcoin ETFs in the United States in January.
China Asset Management (ChinaAMC) told The Block that its spot bitcoin ETF secured $121.7 million in assets under management (AUM) as of the end of the first trading day, while its spot ether ETF had $20.4 million in AUM.
Six spot bitcoin and ether ETFs — managed by China Asset Management, Harvest Global, Bosera, and HashKey — officially debuted in Hong Kong today.
The ChinaAMC Bitcoin ETF led in trading volume, logging HK$37.16 million on the day, according to data from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The ETF gained 1.53% at closing. Its spot ether ETF saw a volume of HK$12.66 million.
Harvest saw HK$17.89 million in its spot bitcoin ETF’s volume and HK$4.95 million in its ether ETF, while Bosera HashKey Bitcoin ETF recorded HK$12.44 million and its ether ETF saw HK$2.48 million in volume on the first day of trading, HKEX data showed.
When the 11 spot bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. began trading in January, their first-day volume reached about $4.6 billion.
“While it’s easy to have overblown expectations — bound to fall short — I actually think the spot ETFs in HK are a success,” Justin d’Anethan, head of APAC business development of crypto market maker Keyrock, told The Block — adding that while the volume is “no near comparable to the launch of spot BTC ETFs in the US, but it’s happening in a very different market dynamic.”
“The fact that Hong Kong, which doesn’t offer access to mainland China investors (it’s worth remembering), is getting some decent buy-in is positive,” said d’Anethan.
Furthermore, Hong Kong’s spot ether ETFs do not offer staking rewards at the moment. “[Missing] out on about 4% APR is not negligible,” d’Anethan added.
Livio Weng, chief executive of HashKey Exchange, told The Block in a group media interview today that fund issuers will need to engage in more discussions with regulators to design and introduce the mechanism of staking rewards, as such activities may be deemed risky.
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