Scaramucci's SkyBridge Capital launches Bitcoin fund with $25 million investment
Anthony Scaramucci, the founder of $9.2 billion fund-of-funds SkyBridge Capital, is launching a Bitcoin fund to "democratize" investing in the cryptocurrency for the "mass affluent" with a lower-fee product.
SkyBridge, a fund of funds that provides a conduit for the mass affluent and registered investment advisors (RIAs) to invest in the hard-to-reach asset class of hedge funds, filed a Form D with the Securities and Exchange Commission for SkyBridge's Bitcoin Fund L.P.
Scaramucci said SkyBridge put in $25 million of its capital and is opening the fund to investors on Jan. 4 with a minimum subscription size of $50,000. He noted that they're already putting together a "nice book" with the preliminary orders.
"One of the things we tried to do is democratize the hedge fund industry and Bitcoin is still somewhat difficult to buy," Scaramucci said.
Like many investors, Scaramucci pointed out that Bitcoin (BTC-USD) falls into the "store of value" category by drawing a comparison to gold, which has a $10 trillion market capitalization versus Bitcoin's $440 billion market cap.
"So, we think there's a very large move for Bitcoin over the next five to ten years. We think it's a product that people will have in their portfolios, and we wanted to get out there with something that could be available to RIAs, the mass affluent, and people who have an interest in owning some digital assets."
The SkyBridge Bitcoin Fund will charge 75 basis-points, versus Grayscale Bitcoin Trust's 2% annual fee.
"Grayscale fund has a tendency to trade at a 20 to 30% premium, so we wanted this to trade at the net asset value of Bitcoin," Scaramucci added.
The fund's back office and storage will be provided by Fidelity Digital Assets, while EY will do the auditing.
Bitcoin has surged more than 228% year-to-date. The cryptocurrency was last trading near $23,673.
Julia La Roche is a correspondent for Yahoo Finance. Follow her on Twitter.