Three of the largest asset managers are diversifying their funds to hold blockchain stocks, throwing more financial power from the establishment behind the bitcoin technology.
The crypto mining sector attracts new investments
Charles Schwab began buying shares in Riot Blockchain, joining Fidelity and Vanguard - former investors in Riot, HIVE Blockchain Technologies, Hut 8 and BC Group - in allocating holdings in mutual funds investment to a cryptocurrency firm, according to financial documents from the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
Stock purchases also double on mutual fund managers' equity investments and pilot projects in space. This summer, Schwab invested in Alchemy, an Ethereum application platform, while Vanguard followed Symbiont's blockchain for foreign exchange transactions, and Fidelity created a digital asset arm - set to launch a trading service and fund of bitcoin index - and backed Coin Metrics, Fireblock and Everledger.
Investments in figures
Data from the first half of this year shows that Charles Schwab Investment Management, Inc. bought 22.977 Riot shares for $ 52.000. Two Vanguard funds - the Vanguard Index Fund and the Vanguard Valley Forge Index Fund - invested in 954.229 Riot shares worth $ 2.118.000, and two Fidelity funds separately invested in 176.242 Riot shares worth $ 230.115 (split between a NASDAQ index and three market indices) and 2.769.759 HIVE Shares valued at $ 1.003.163.
Riot Blockchain, based in the United States, and HIVE Blockchain Technologies, based in Canada, provide services for bitcoin mining, a process in which new cryptocurrency is minted. Outside of the United States, a third Fidelity fund - Fidelity International - acquired 10.451.094 shares worth $ 1,80 each of Hut 8, a Canadian bitcoin mining company, for the first time this year, and 17 million. of shares priced at HK $ 6,50 (US $ 8,30) of BC Group, a Hong Kong based digital asset platform company.
Riot shares in the two Vanguard funds and a third Vanguard fund - the Vanguard Institutional Index Fund - have increased over the past three years, which resulted in holding 269.610 shares combined for $ 7.912.000 in 2017, 187.049 shares for $ 282.000 in 2018 and 826.391 shares for $ 925.000 in 2019.
Holdings also rose again for the Riot holding Fidelity fund - the Fidelity Concord Street Trust - which bought 188.277 shares for $ 1.185.607 through 2018 and 159.263 shares for $ 270.375 through 2019.
The numbers drop for the Fidelity Securities Fund's investments in HIVE, with 5.792.880 shares for $ 82.433.000 at the end of 2017, 4.972.700 shares for $ 821.000 as of 2018 and 2.784.259 shares for $ 367.980 until 2019.
