cryptovibes.com
Cryptocurrency adoption seems to be taking centre stage in many countries around the world and Switzerland is not an exception. The adoption is gaining massive momentum in the European country as local financial authorities grant increased regulatory approvals for the developed crypto investment instruments.
On September 29, 2021, the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) officially announced that it had approved the Crypto Market Index Fund as the “first crypto fund according to Swiss law.” The fund tracks the performance of the 10 biggest cryptos from SIX Swiss Exchange’s Crypto Market Index 10.
This fund is launched by Swiss asset manager Crypto Finance and administered by investment management firm PvB Pernet von Ballmoos AG. Custody is provided by regulated custodian SEBA Bank AG.
FINMA said that the newly approved fund is currently limited to serve the qualified investors that invest mainly in cryptos or digital assets “based on the blockchain or distributed ledger technology.”
The watchdog said that the Crypto Market Index Fund might just invest in leading cryptos with a “sufficiently large trading volume.” Based on reports by Crypto Finance, this fund will track performances of the Crypto Market Index 10. Crypto Finance said:
“The objective of the Crypto Market Index 10 is to reliably measure the performance of the largest, liquid crypto assets and tokens and to provide an investable benchmark for this asset class.”
On its part, FINMA said that it would need investors to invest via established counterparties that are mainly based in a member country of the Financial Action Task Force and are subject to the corresponding anti-money laundering (AML) regulations.
In connection with the fund approval, FINMA has also approved SEBA Bank AG as an institutional-grade custodian service. It has granted the firm a CISA license. In the past, the authority officially let SIX Swiss Exchange unleash and operate a digital marketplace and central securities depository built on distributed ledger technology sometime earlier this month.