The Bitcoin Fund announced April 9 that it has already completed both its initial public offering (IPO) and merger with 3iQ Bitcoin Trust.

The launch of The Bitcoin Fund’s offering was only given a favorable ruling by the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) back in October 2019. This was after a series of talks with regulators over the offering for three years.

As of now, The Bitcoin Fund already has an asset base of approximately $14 million, with class A units that amount to 1,491,800. These units are available to all investors, as stated in its prospectus.

According to the announcement from 3iQ, “the Class A Units will commence trading today in the Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbol QBTC.U.” 3iQ is the investment and portfolio manager of the fund. The Canadian investment fund manager currently focuses on giving investors more exposure to digital assets.

The Fund’s Investment Strategy

The objective of the fund is to provide holders of units with exposure to Bitcoin (BTC) and its price movements in the US dollar price equivalent, and an opportunity for investors to profit from their capital long-term.

The prospectus details that the immediate plan for the fund is to invest in “long-term holdings of BTC” which they will purchase from trusted BTC exchanges and other counter-parties. According to them, this will help give investors a more “convenient, secure alternative to a direct investment in BTC.” They add that they “will not speculate with regard to short-term changes in BTC prices.”

The Fund also recognizes that crypto exchange platforms are not regulated as securities exchanges or commodity futures exchanges under Canadian or US laws. That is why they will make sure that they will only transact with exchanges that are found to be in compliance with Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations.

For the interest of its investors, they clarified that they have no intention to borrow money or use other forms of leverage in order to purchase BTCs. However, the exception is only when they are anticipating an additional offering of units. In such a case, they will only borrow money on a short-term basis but it will not exceed 25% of the Net Asset Value of the fund.

How will they monitor Bitcoin prices?

In monitoring the value of BTC’s price, they will use the MVIS Cryptocompare Institutional Bitcoin Index (MVBTC) to calculate the value of BTC.

According to Cryptocompare, they already have the license for The Bitcoin Fund. This index will provide investors with an overview of BTCs performance on different exchanges.

Other companies that co-led the offering were Canaccord Genuity Corp., and Echelon Wealth Partners Inc., including Leede Jones Gable Inc., Mackie Research Capital Corporation and PI Financial Corp.

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