Bitcoin’s popularity continues to rise, and it is being favored by more and more institutional funds, and Morgan Stanley Asset Management may also become one of the heavyweights.

Bloomberg quoted people familiar with the matter as reporting that Counterpoint Global, the asset management arm of Morgan Stanley, is considering whether to bet on Bitcoin and seek approval from the parent company and regulators.

According to information on the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) website, Morgan Stanley had previously acquired nearly 11% of MicroStrategy. The company has invested heavily in Bitcoin in the past few months and used Bitcoin as its main reserve asset. This acquisition by Morgan Stanley is equivalent to an indirect investment in Bitcoin.

As an investment department with an asset management scale of up to US$150 billion, Counterpoint Global has long been a leader in mutual fund rankings. Thanks to concentrated investment in stocks that benefited from the epidemic, such as e-commerce and streaming media, 5 of its 19 funds will have a return of more than 100% in 2020.

If you really enter Bitcoin, Morgan Stanley Asset Management is undoubtedly a heavyweight player, which also means that at the institutional level, Bitcoin’s influence is once again recognized.

After Tesla announced that it has invested 1.5 billion US dollars to configure Bitcoin and plans to accept cryptocurrency as a payment method, cryptocurrency assets such as Bitcoin seem to have embarked on the fast lane to be accepted by institutions. In the morning of February 12th, Beijing time, the price of Bitcoin once broke through the 49,000 mark, setting a new record high. At present, the currency price is still at a high level above 47,000 US dollars, and has soared about 4 times in the past four months.

On Thursday, February 11, BNY Mellon, the oldest bank in the United States and a major custodian provider, announced that it will hold, transfer and issue bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies for institutional clients starting later this year , The final plan is to treat digital currency as equals to other assets such as treasury bonds and technology stocks. The platform for implementing the plan is still in the prototype stage. The bank is already discussing plans to include digital currency in custody with clients such as asset management managers.

Roman Regelman, CEO of the Bank of New York Mellon Asset Services and Digital Business, said that “digital assets have become mainstream.” As the price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies rises, asset management companies, hedge funds and other institutional investors are beginning to demand Large custodian banks treat digital assets like other more traditional assets.

He also said that it will take three to five years to fully integrate digital assets into Wall Street’s traditional infrastructure, but there are signs that this day is coming. Bank of New York Mellon does not limit the types of encrypted digital assets that customers are allowed to apply for custody. Some analysts say that this is the first large-scale custodian bank to announce a roadmap that treats digital currencies as other traditional assets.

On Wednesday, the global payment giant MasterCard announced that it plans to support certain digital currencies on its network later this year. The company also stated that it is actively maintaining contact with major central banks that plan to launch digital currencies around the world. At present, MasterCard has provided customers with cards for digital currency transactions and will add digital currency payment functions. This change may open the door to new customers who have already flocked to digital assets.

At the same time, asset management giant BlackRock and payment giants Square and PayPal have recently begun to support digital currencies.

Since the beginning of this year, a large amount of funds have poured into cryptocurrencies through tools including Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC). Institutional investors are restricted by fund rules and cannot directly hold bitcoins, so they turned to these trust instruments.

Cathie Wood, the head of ARK and his company analyst Yassine Elmandjra, previously known as the “Bull Queen”, said that the current level of Bitcoin hype is very low, and speculation is far less than the bull market in the second half of 2017. This is a ten-year period. Times of super opportunity, institutions are the main drivers of this wave of rise.

Cathie Wood said in an interview with Yahoo Finance that the low correlation between Bitcoin and other asset classes is one of the important factors for many institutions to invest in Bitcoin.

Buy some bitcoins, and you will further enrich your investment portfolio and exchange lower risks for more lucrative returns, which is why institutions seek such low correlations. And this is exactly what Bitcoin has.