JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM), the largest U.S. bank with more than $3 trillion U.S. of assets, has started giving its wealth management clients access to cryptocurrency funds.
Financial advisors at JPMorgan Chase are placing private bank clients into a new Bitcoin fund created with cryptocurrency firm NYDIG. The fund is nearly identical to one NYDIG offers to clients of American investment bank Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS).
JPMorgan has also rolled out access to four funds from Grayscale Investments and one from Osprey Funds: the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, Grayscale Bitcoin Cash Trust, Grayscale Ethereum Trust, Grayscale Ethereum Classic Trust and Osprey Bitcoin Trust.
The rollout of cryptocurrency funds at JPMorgan comes even though the bank’s Chief Executive Officer, Jamie Dimon, has been one of Wall Street’s most outspoken skeptics of Bitcoin and other digital assets.
While Dimon has called Bitcoin a “fraud” that wouldn’t end well, he has conceded that “Clients are interested (in cryptocurrencies), and I don’t tell clients what to do.”
JPMorgan advisors aren’t allowed to recommend the Grayscale or Osprey funds but can respond to client requests for access to cryptocurrencies.
And, while the bank is making cryptocurrency funds widely available across its various wealth management platforms, only private bank clients can access the new NYDIG fund.
Private bank clients at JPMorgan Chase typically have at least $10 million U.S. in assets and are considered to be more sophisticated investors.