US global investment firm gains cryptocurrency exposure through Grayscale fund

US Global Investors, a Texas-based investment management firm, already holds significant exposure to gold, minerals, precious metals, oil and other natural resources.
US Global Investors, a Texas-based investment management firm with $4.6 billion in assets under management as of the first quarter of 2021, has bought exposure to Bitcoin.
According to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday, US Global Investors added more than $566,389 worth of Grayscale Bitcoin Fund (GBTC) shares to three of its eight mutual funds as of June 30. The filing shows that the company's Gold and Precious Metals Fund invested $302,899 in GBTC, its World Precious Minerals Fund invested $222,532, and its Global Resources Fund invested $40,958.
Bitcoin exposure accounts for 0.19% of the fund's net assets, and the gold and precious metals fund alone has about $158 million in assets under management. However, this seems like a surprising investment from a company with large exposure to gold, minerals, precious metals, oil and other natural resources. US Global Investors also classifies GBTC as a regular stock.
“This is not surprising, nor does it indicate a shift in the way other gold stock managers view cryptocurrencies or Bitcoin,” said gold supporter Peter Schiff. Schiff further noted that US Global Investors CEO Frank Holmes is also executive chairman of cryptocurrency mining company Hive Blockchain.
As a gold supporter like Schiff, Holmes previously predicted that the prices of Bitcoin and Ethereum (ETH) could reach $80,000 and $3,000, respectively, in 2021. While Bitcoin’s all-time high price stagnated at $64,899 in April, ETH’s price far exceeded Holmes’ prediction, reaching an all-time high price of $4,384 in May.
Whatever the reason — hedging inflation bets, responding to investor interest — other major investment firms have bought GBTC. Morgan Stanley’s Insight Fund owns about 928,000 shares of Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust, and SEC filings show that Edge Wealth Management, JPMorgan Chase, Ark Invest, and Rothschild Investment Corporation have also invested in BTC through Grayscale.