Grayscale’s Bitcoin investment product, the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), has seen its discount to Bitcoin’s price decrease significantly, reaching a level of just 17% below BTC price parity. Data from CoinGlass confirms that as of September 9, GBTC shares were trading at a discount of only 17.17% compared to BTC/USD, media reports said.
This shift in fortunes for GBTC comes in the wake of positive news regarding BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, filing an application for the first Bitcoin spot price-based exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the United States. This development was particularly significant for Grayscale which was already engaged in a legal battle with U.S. regulators over converting GBTC into a spot ETF.
Grayscale achieved a significant victory against the SEC last month as the court asked SEC to review its cancellation of Grayscale’s application for converting GBTC into spot ETF.
The discount of GBTC shares to Bitcoin’s price, once known as the “GBTC Premium,” stood at just 17.17% on September 9th, marking its most favorable level since December 2021. The premium had been negative, indicating a discount to net asset value, for some time and at one point had reached nearly 50%.
Despite this narrowing of the discount, GBTC has started to diverge from the strength of the Bitcoin price, which is still experiencing a downward trend as it tests levels not seen for the past six months. At the time of writing, BTC was trading at under $25,500, with the Wall Street opening session exacerbating the subdued market sentiment.