Crypto management firm Valkyrie Investments, one of Grayscale’s rivals, has announced a plan to become the sponsor and manager of the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) fund. As part of its plan to sponsor GBTC, the Tennessee-based company also launched a fund to take advantage of its discount.

December saw the lowest monthly total for cryptocurrency theft for the past year, with $62.2 million worth of cryptocurrencies stolen, according to blockchain security company CertiK.

Liquid staking protocol Lido Finance has seen its total value locked (TVL) surpass that of MakerDAO, the maker of DAI, to become the largest protocol in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space by TVL.

Top stories in the Crypto Roundup today:

• Valkyrie Announces Plan to Sponsor Grayscale Bitcoin Trust
• Crypto Theft Sees ‘Lowest Monthly Figure’ in December
• Lido Overtake MakerDAO’s Total Value Locked to Top Defi Rankings
• Digital Asset Investment Product Outflows Continued in December

Valkyrie Announces Plan to Sponsor Grayscale Bitcoin Trust

Crypto management firm Valkyrie Investments, one of Grayscale’s rivals, has announced a plan to become the sponsor and manager of the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) fund. As part of its plan to sponsor GBTC, the Tennessee-based company also launched a fund to take advantage of its discount.

The fund, the Valkyrie Opportunistic Fund, LP is set to take advantage of GBTC’s discount on the value of its underlying bitcoin. The firm previously launched a bitcoin trust and bitcoin-related exchange-traded fund in 2021.

In its proposal, Valkyrie wrote:

“We understand that Grayscale has played an important role in the development and growth of the bitcoin ecosystem with the launch of GBTC, and we respect the team and the work that they have done. However, in light of recent events involving Grayscale and its family of affiliated companies, it is time for a change.”

The firm said it wants to facilitate GBTC redemptions at net asset value (NAV) for investors through a Regulation M filing. It also proposed to lower the fees to 75 basis points, as opposed to the current 200 basis points.

Valkyrie would offer GBTC redemptions in both BTC and cash. Its proposal comes at a time in which GBTC shares hit a record-high discount rate of over 50% to NAV.

Crypto Theft Sees ‘Lowest Monthly Figure’ in December

December saw the lowest monthly total for cryptocurrency theft for the past year, with $62.2 million worth of cryptocurrencies stolen, according to blockchain security company CertiK.

The blockchain security company listed the month’s most significant attacks on the microblogging platform Twitter, highlighting exit scams as the method that managed to steal the most, at $15.5 million. In second place came flash loan-based exploits, stealing $7.6 million.

According to CertiK, the 23 largest attacks accounted for 98.5% of the total stolen, with the largest exploit of the month being the $15 million Helio Protocol incident, which saw a trader take advantage of a price discrepancy to borrow millions of the protocol’s HAY stablecoin, causing the loan to be undercollateralized and leading to a loss for the protocol.

Lido Overtake MakerDAO’s Total Value Locked to Top Defi Rankings

Liquid staking protocol Lido Finance has seen its total value locked (TVL) surpass that of MakerDAO, the maker of DAI, to become the largest protocol in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space by TVL.

According to available data, Lido Finance’s total value locked has risen to $5.9 billion, surpassing MakerDAO’s $5.89 billion and AAVE’s $3.7 billion. The protocol allows users to access liquid Ether staking without committing to the 32 ETH minimum to become a validator.

Demand for liquid staking solutions has grown since Ethereum’s Merge upgrade, which saw it move to a Proof-of-Stake consensus. ETH staked isn’t currently withdrawable, and Lido allows users to maintain liquidity by issuing stETH tokens backed by the staked ETH.

In November 2022, Lido said it had been collecting over $1 million in fees per day since October 2022, as its popularity surged.

Digital Asset Investment Product Outflows Continued in December

In December, there was a significant rise in the withdrawal of funds from digital asset investment products, possibly due to concerns about the security of exchanges like Binance and issues with FTX.

The average weekly net outflows from digital asset investment products reached a six-month high of -$9.5 million.

Read more on CryptoCompare’s latest Digital Asset Management Review.

State of the Crypto by Top Tier Exchange Volume

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