Grayscale's new CEO and Head of Distribution and Strategic Partnerships, John Hoffman, has been investing in BTC since 2013, but "it took much longer to emotionally invest in its innovation." Hoffman also stated that in terms of time, the innovation trigger for blockchain has already passed 15 years, but when considering its adoption and impact, it may currently only be at 1% of its exponential trend. Hoffman expects that digital assets will change the way people live, work, and entertain themselves in the next decade, and that we are currently on the "enlightenment slope," with the early promises of blockchain increasingly being put into practice and demonstrating real-world utility.

John Hoffman, formerly of Invesco, has been appointed as the new Managing Director and Head of Distribution and Partnerships at Grayscale Investments. This appointment comes as Grayscale intensifies its efforts to launch a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF). Hoffman's extensive experience in the ETF space is expected to play a vital role in this initiative. Grayscale's move to hire Hoffman signifies its commitment to advancing its position in the competitive race to launch a spot Bitcoin ETF, which is part of a broader industry trend. The SEC's timeline for approving Bitcoin spot ETFs remains uncertain despite a favorable court ruling that mandated the SEC to review its applications.

According to a memo released this week, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is in official contact with asset management companies before making a decision on whether to approve a Bitcoin ETF. The regulatory agency stated in a memo that it met with Grayscale on Thursday to discuss the potential conversion of its Bitcoin Trust fund into an ETF. SEC officials also met with representatives from BlackRock and Nasdaq. While the SEC may still decide to block crypto ETFs, many industry experts expect such funds to launch in the US early next year. In recent months, the regulatory agency has delayed decisions on several Bitcoin funds and may choose to approve or reject all applications around the same time.

According to Coinglass data, the current Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) negative premium rate is 8.09%. Additionally, the Grayscale Litecoin Trust has a premium rate of 28.36%, the Bitcoin Cash Trust has a premium rate of 13.99%, the Zcash Trust has a premium rate of 6.05%, the Solana Trust has a premium rate of 308.53%, and the Filecoin Trust has a premium rate of 713.54%.

Grayscale, the management company of the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust Fund (GBTC), is updating the trust agreement for the first time since 2018. The purpose of this update is to optimize the structure of GBTC in order to achieve the expected upgrade to a spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) and provide a fair competitive environment for asset management giants such as BlackRock. The GBTC update will be subject to shareholder voting, which will involve two proposed modifications to the trust agreement.

FTX has been approved to sell $744 million in Grayscale assets, according to Bloomberg.

According to Coinglass data, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) negative premium rate has narrowed to 8.76%, while the Ethereum Trust (ETH) negative premium rate is 12.19%. In addition, the Ethereum Classic Trust (ETC) has a negative premium of 30.67%, while the Litecoin Trust (LTC) has a positive premium of 21.45% and the Bitcoin Cash Trust (BCH) has a positive premium of 16.75%.

On November 26th, the official website of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) disclosed two memorandums.One memorandum shows that on November 20th Eastern Time, the SEC discussed the proposed rule changes for the listing and trading of Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF with Grayscale.<br>The other memorandum shows that on the same day, the SEC held a meeting with BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company, to discuss proposed rule changes for the listing and trading of iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF. The memorandum shows two ETF redemption methods: In-Kind Redemption Model or In-Cash Redemption Model. In-Kind Redemption Model means that the final redemption is the Bitcoin shares held by the ETF, while In-Cash Redemption replaces Bitcoin shares with equivalent cash. Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart tweeted that BlackRock seems to prefer the former. <br>

According to Coinglass data reported by Golden Finance, the negative premium rate of Grayscale GBTC has narrowed to 8.07%, the negative premium rate of ETH trust is 12.73%. In addition, the negative premium rate of ETC trust is 33.31%, the positive premium rate of LTC trust is 12.40%, and the positive premium rate of BCH trust is 13.20%.

Morgan Stanley analysts have stated that since the beginning of this year, traders have been buying Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), with the trading price of GBTC being lower than the potential value of the Bitcoin it holds. This is likely in the hopes of earning a profit from the price difference when it is converted into physical Bitcoin ETFs. This means that many GBTC traders will seek to cash out when it is converted into ETFs. Morgan Stanley's analysts have reviewed the fund inflows of GBTC since 2023 to calculate the value of GBTC that may be sold during the conversion. The analysts estimate this number to be approximately $2.7 billion.