Hashdex to liquidate $14.7M Bitcoin ETF; IBIT draws $143.6M

Hashdex halted NYSE Arca trading of the DEFI Bitcoin ETF on Aug. 17 and will liquidate the fund’s remaining holdings, returning proceeds to shareholders in cash.

The asset manager announced the DEFI closure on Aug. 3, completed the fund’s final trading day and stopped accepting creation orders on Aug. 17. DEFI held roughly $14.7 million in assets under management as of July 30. Hashdex cited the fund’s asset base, trading liquidity, operating costs, investor interest and product fit in its decision to close the series.

A liquidation plan filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission stated that DEFI’s net assets relative to operating expenses made continued operation unreasonable and imprudent over the long term.

Shareholders who held DEFI after Aug. 17 no longer have exchange liquidity. Their shares will be converted to a cash distribution calculated from the fund’s net asset value during the liquidation. The payout will be reduced by closing and transaction costs and will change with Bitcoin price movements while the remaining holdings are sold.

Hashdex’s public materials show different target dates for the distribution. A public announcement and a press release exhibit indicate a payment on or about Aug. 28. The main body of the Aug. 3 SEC filing and the liquidation plan reference an on-or-about Aug. 24 date and note that dates may change. The sponsor’s shareholder timetable currently points to late August but does not guarantee a fixed date.

DEFI is the sole series of the Hashdex Commodities Trust and is separate from the Hashdex Nasdaq CME Crypto Index ETF, ticker NCIQ. Hashdex continues to manage more than $200 million in products available to U.S. investors.

On Aug. 18 U.S. Bitcoin ETF products recorded provisional net inflows of about $189.3 million, with BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust, IBIT, accounting for roughly $143.6 million of that total. IBIT’s net assets were listed at $48.07 billion as of Aug. 5.