Asset Manager Stone Ridge’s NYDIG Sees Wall of Money Coming Into Bitcoin — Institutions Grow Beyond Owning BTC

The founder of Stone Ridge Asset Management and the New York Digital Investment Group (NYDIG) sees a “wall of money” coming into bitcoin based on his firm’s order book. The executive believes that institutions are just getting started and we will see an explosion of bitcoin-focused traditional financial products within a year.

NYDIG Bullish on Bitcoin

Stone Ridge Asset Management and NYDIG founder Ross Stevens shared his insight on institutional adoption of bitcoin last week in an interview with Microstrategy CEO Michael Saylor. Stevens founded Stone Ridge in 2012 and NYDIG in 2017, where he now serves as its executive chairman. Today, “NYDIG is a full service vertically integrated bitcoin-only financial services firm,” he described.

“A year ago, we had 25 institutional clients,” he told Saylor. “Today, we have 280 institutional clients. We’ve got a pipeline in the onboarding process of 96.” Stevens added that at the current capacity, his company can onboard 75 institutions a month. He further revealed:

We’ve got over $6 billion in bitcoin now between what’s in the door and what’s committed from institutions … By the end of the year, I’m confident we’ll have over $25 billion of bitcoin.

Stevens emphasized: “I’ve just got this order book. I’m not guessing. I see what’s happening.”

As for the types of institutions that are investing in bitcoin, Stevens said: “All kinds of institutions are adopting bitcoin: public companies, private companies, hedge funds, private equity funds, credit funds. Even investors who if you asked me a year ago would they come in I would say absolutely not.”

Emphasizing, “I know for sure because I’m not guessing. They’re just getting started and these institutions want to do more than just own bitcoin. That’s table stakes,” he elaborated:

Within a year, America is going to be able to get a portion of their income annuities paid in bitcoin. Americans will be able to get a portion of their salaries paid in bitcoin. You want that paltry interest on your CD paid in bitcoin, you’ll be able to get that too. There’s going to be an explosion in bitcoin-driven financial innovation.

He continued: “Another interesting phenomenon we are seeing in our book is exactly zero clients have walked back the allocation. That may not be true for other firms but that’s true for us. So, once people get off zero, they either stand pat or they increase.” Furthermore, he opined that right now:

What’s driving … accelerating institutional adoption is the view of bitcoin being de-risked. I think that’s why you’re just going to see a wall of money … coming into the asset class.

What do you think about the NYDIG founder’s expectation about bitcoin? Let us know in the comments section below.