Something extraordinarily ironic happened in crypto this week: you can now buy ETFs through major financial institutions like Fidelity and BlackRock.
Interestingly you can’t buy them with Vanguard, who termed crypto a ‘non-productive investment’ and against the company’s ethos of thoughtful risk management on behalf of investors.
The backlash from the crypto world against Vanguard’s decision is quite astounding when you consider what’s actually happening here.
Bitcoin, for example, launched in 2009 as a disrupter to the ‘Big Finance’, the entire principle behind its existence is as an independent alternative to traditional banking institutions. You could mine it independently, store it independently, trade it independently, it’s really a remarkable concept when you think about it.
That’s what makes the full-circle news this week so interesting – not only can you now buy a piece of the action through these established financial giants, but crypto investors are actually expressing outrange at Vanguard for not offering similar funds to their customers.
To make things even more interesting, the approval of the funds this week caused crypto value to go down quite significantly, up to 17% at time of writing, and Vanguard were called out for this in some circles for appearing to delegitimise the integrity of the crypto ETF market. Now read that sentence again, isn’t that amazing?
The ceaseless march of establishment capitalism is so strong and pervasive that it can even orchestrate a swallowing of its competitors whilst creating a market to profit from them on the way down, all the while provoking calls for a more thorough execution of the downfall from those who stand to lose.
What a world.
Digital Becca 