Hedge fund firm Brevan Howard will begin investing in digital assets, including bitcoin, for its clients.
The firm has set up a new fund that will start to invest in a wide range of digital assets, a person familiar with the matter said. Bloomberg reported an allocation of up to 1.5% of Brevan Howard's $5.6 billion main hedge fund, which the person said was accurate.
Brevan Howard co-founder Alan Howard in a private capacity launched digital trading technologies firm Elwood Asset Management four years ago. At the time, Brevan Howard decided cryptocurrency and digital assets-related infrastructure wasn't mature enough for institutional investment.
However, the firm, which ran $13.7 billion in assets as of the end of February, has been monitoring the situation and in the fourth quarter decided it had matured enough and made plans to invest, the person said.
A key priority for Brevan Howard has been the safety and security of assets in the fund. As such, the firm has partnered with Elwood, which will handle all trading via its trading platform. The firm will trade on multiple established and robust trading venues, with assets held by several custodians.
Brevan Howard's initial allocation will be overseen by cryptocurrency investment firm Distributed Global's co-founders and managing partners, Johnny Steindorff and Tucker Waterman. The investment mandate is long-only, focusing on a range of digital assets and not just bitcoin, the person said.
A spokesman for Brevan Howard declined to comment.
