The transaction highlights how the digital assets space continues to draw investment from wealth managers, banks and other financial players.

US-based asset manager Wave Financial has bought a minority stake in Switzerland’s Criptonite Asset Management, a business operating in fields such as bitcoin. 

Wave Financial’s minority stake acquisition is the first step of a full purchase, the SEC-registered business said in a statement today. The entire firm will be bought at the end of 2022, it added. 

This is the first purchase outside the US for Los Angeles-based Wave.

The move follows the strategic partnership between the two companies in 2021 and Criptonite's launch of several Actively Managed Certificates (AMCs) of Wave Financial's flagship digital asset funds in Europe, including the Wave Bitcoin Income & Growth and NFT funds. 

The transaction highlights how the digital assets space continues to draw investment from wealth managers, banks and other financial players. While bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have fallen sharply this year, interest does not appear to have faded. And the underlying distributed ledger technology known as blockchain is also being used by financial firms in a number of ways. (See here for an overview of developments.) 

By acquiring Geneva-based Criptonite, Wave will be able to take advantage of increasing demand for regulated digital asset investment fund products in Europe, Wave said. 

"We have seen unprecedented demand from institutional and other accredited investors for professionally managed digital asset funds in Europe. There seems to be a flight to quality taking place, so it makes sense to take our relationship with Criptonite to the next level,” Matteo Dante Perruccio, president for international business at Wave Financial, said. “They share our strong focus on risk management and compliance and have been a fantastic partner over the past twelve months and we are excited to be solidifying that relationship."

"This acquisition is Wave Financial's first outside the US but will not be our last as we are actively looking for other partners to bring our diverse set of digital asset funds and solutions to accredited investors around the world,” Perruccio said. 

Florian Rais, founder and chief executive of Criptonite AM said: "We were already happy to obtain an operating licence from FINMA, but we are now truly thrilled to formally get together with SEC-registered Wave Financial. This opens a new era for us, in which we will have the opportunity to propose a unique investment offering.”

For other recent articles published here on wealth management and digital assets, see examples here, here and here.