Australia’s first bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), the Cosmos Asset Management’s Bitcoin ETF, will be listed on the Cboe equities trading platform next week. Speculators have suggested that the fund could see $1 billion inflows after going live.

Popular commission-free trading platform Robinhood has revealed it has agreed to buy London-based fintech app Ziglu, which allows users to trade bitcoin and other cryptoassets. The acquisition is set to help Robinhood’s plans to expand in the UK and Europe.

The chief legal officer of Nasdaq-listed cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, Paul Grewal, has said that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposal to update its definition of an exchange “doesn’t work” and is “going beyond its authority.”

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

• Australia’s First Bitcoin ETF to Launch Next Week
• Robinhood to Buy Crypto App Ziglu as It Plans to Launch in the UK and Europe
• SEC Exchange Definition ‘Doesn’t Work’, Says Coinbase’s Chief Legal Officer
• What is an ETF?

Australia’s First Bitcoin ETF to Launch Next Week

Australia’s first bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), the Cosmos Asset Management’s Bitcoin ETF, will be listed on the Cboe equities trading platform next week. Speculators have suggested that the fund could see $1 billion inflows after going live.

Australia Securities Exchange (ASX) Clear, the clearinghouse at the center of Australian capital markets, has confirmed it has four market participants that will cover the initial margin requirements of 42%. A notice will be sent to market participants on Wednesday to allow the product to start trading on April 27.

The Cosmos fund offers indirect exposure to spot BTC investments through the Purpose bitcoin ETF that was  listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange last November.

Cosmos Asset Management beat other contenders including VanEck, BetaShares, and EFT Securities in launching the country’s first Bitcoin ETF. It’s the second crypto-related Cosmos launch after it issued its Global Digital Miners Access ETF last year.

Robinhood to Buy Crypto App Ziglu as It Plans to Launch in the UK and Europe

Popular commission-free trading platform Robinhood has revealed it has agreed to buy London-based fintech app Ziglu, which allows users to trade bitcoin and other cryptoassets. The acquisition is set to help Robinhood’s plans to expand in the UK and Europe.

The deal could provide Robinhood’s growth prospects a crucial boost after the company reported a drop in monthly active users in the fourth quarter of 2021, to 17.3 million from 18.9 million the previous quarter.

Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev said the acquisition will help the firm “accelerate” its global expansion efforts, and added:

“Together with the Ziglu team, we’ll work to leverage the best of both companies, exploring new ways to innovate and break down barriers for customers across the UK and Europe.”

Founded in 2018, Ziglu lets users invest in a range of cryptoassets and earn interest on their holdings. The company is one of the few in the country that has managed to register with the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority.

SEC Exchange Definition ‘Doesn’t Work’, Says Coinbase’s Chief Legal Officer

The chief legal officer of Nasdaq-listed cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, Paul Grewal, has said that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s proposal to update its definition of an exchange “doesn’t work” and is “going beyond its authority.”

The proposal, published in January, would change the definition of an exchange to add “systems that offer the use of non-firm trading interest and communications protocols to bring together buyers and sellers of securities.”

Non-firm trading interest means an asset and a quantity or price have been indicated by a buyer or seller, with the rest of the details of the potential trade being determined later.

According to Grewal, the new definition would be broad enough to apply to decentralized finance platforms if they trade securities. To Coinbase’s chief legal officer the SEC “needs to be precise when altering definitions going forward” and should “provide clear guidance to the market as to how its rules will be applied.”

Moreover, Grewal said that when it indents to apply new rules to digital assets, the SEC should “explain how it thinks those rules will affect this new and evolving market.”

What is an ETF?

Given all the talk and hype surrounding crypto ETFs, let’s try to gain a better conceptual understanding about them. Traditional ETFs are essentially types of investment instruments and are classified as securities. Most ETFs track real-world assets such as gold, oil, and various other types of commodities.

Investors who acquire ETFs are able to get exposure to a certain asset without actually physically needing to buy it. For example, instead of going through the lengthy process of buying gold, having it get delivered, and safely storing it, you could simply buy an ETF that tracks gold. This way, you can potentially get the same returns from your investment as if you were actually in possession of the gold itself, minus a small fee.

An ETF can also be described as a fund whose shares investors can buy while being able to earn dividends or interest from their investment. Additionally, traditional ETFs have been used for many years in traditional financial markets to track benchmark indexes as well. These indexes include the US Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), the NASDAQ-100, and the S&P 500.

Learn more about traditional and crypto ETFs via CryptoCompare’s guide.

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