Morgan Stanley targets crypto ETF market with bitcoin, solana filings

Morgan Stanley has filed a registration statement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, positioning itself to launch a spot bitcoin BTC$93,734.02 exchange-traded fund (ETF), according to a Form S-1 submitted on Jan. 6.

The product, called the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust, is structured as an exchange traded fund designed to track the price of bitcoin, net of fees and expenses. If approved, the fund’s shares are expected to list on a national securities exchange under a ticker symbol that has not yet been disclosed.

The Trust is sponsored by Morgan Stanley Investment Management and will hold bitcoin directly rather than using derivatives or leverage. Its net asset value will be calculated daily using a designated bitcoin pricing benchmark derived from activity on major spot exchanges. The fund will be passive and will not attempt to trade bitcoin based on market conditions.

Shares will be created and redeemed only in large blocks by authorized participants, either in cash or in kind. Cash transactions will be executed through third party bitcoin counterparties selected by the sponsor. Retail investors will be able to buy and sell shares on the secondary market through brokerage accounts.

Morgan Stanley’s filing follows the rapid expansion of spot bitcoin ETFs in the U.S. market over the past two years. SoSoValue data shows these now have $123 billion in total net assets, equivalent to 6.57% of bitcoin’s total market capitalization. Since the start of the year, net inflows to these products have topped $1.1 billion.

BlackRock’s spot bitcoin ETFs became the firm’s top revenue source in November last year, according to the Blackrock Brazil’s director of business development Cristiano Castro, with allocations nearing $100 billion.

Morgan Stanley has also filed a Form S-1 with the SEC for the Morgan Stanley Solana Trust, meant to track the price of solana. These funds, data shows, have grown to more than $1 billion in total net assets after seeing a total cumulative net inflow of nearly $800 million.

The filings show Morgan Stanley shifting from simply distributing third‑party crypto products to building its own in‑house vehicles, signaling a deeper, higher‑conviction commitment to digital assets.

This pivot is likely driven by the rich economics of the ETF and trust business, underscored by how much fee revenue firms like BlackRock have generated from spot bitcoin products in a short period of time.

Unlike asset managers such as BlackRock, Morgan Stanley operates a massive wealth management arm with thousands of advisors that opened crypto access to clients in October last year. By leveraging its own ETFs, the bank can vertically integrate the products into its client portfolios, keeping the management fees in-house rather than paying them out to competitors.