Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt. Subscribe to the Morning Minute on Substack.
GM!
Today’s top news:
Crypto majors pop 7-10% as Vanguard debuts crypto access; BTC at $92,900
Bank of America recommends up to 4% crypto allocation for wealth clients
Pudgy Penguins announce partnership with NHL for Winter Classic
💼 Bank of America Adds Crypto to Its Official Allocation Models
Yesterday it was Vanguard. Today it’s Bank of America.
More and more TradFi giants are reversing course on crypto.
📌 What Happened
Bank of America’s wealth division has added crypto to its model portfolios for the first time, recommending a 1% to 4% allocation for clients.
The new framework lists digital assets as an acceptable small allocation alongside other alternative investments and will be used by Merrill Wealth Management and Merrill Edge advisors going forward (along with new pitch materials).
The recommendation applies to both high-net-worth and mass-affluent clients.
This change came just a day after Vanguard expanded access to spot Bitcoin, Ethereum, and XRP ETFs after a multi-year holdout.
The market liked the news, with Bitcoin legging up 2% to near $93,000 and other crypto majors like ETH and SOL jumping 9-10%.
🗣️ What Are They Saying
“For investors with a strong interest in thematic innovation and comfort with elevated volatility, a modest allocation of 1% to 4% in digital assets could be appropriate.” – Chris Hyzy, Bank of America Private Bank’s chief investment officer
Huge news:
Bank of America Private Bank & Wealth Management, one of the largest in the country (>$2 trillion), announced it will allow advisors to allocate 1-4% to Bitcoin starting in January.
Grateful $BITB is included in the options they’ve selected.
ongoing buying as funds are directed into the market (the infinite twap)
As a reminder, Bank of America isn’t alone in these recommendations.
Fidelity has provided portfolio allocation guidance of 2-5% to BTC with up to 7.5% for younger investors.
Soon enough, these allocations will be standard across all wealth management providers…
🌎 Macro Crypto and Memes
A few Crypto and Web3 headlines that caught my eye:
Crypto majors are very green up 6-10% after Vanguard’s crypto debut & news out of BofA; BTC +6% at $92,900; ETH +9% at $3,070, BNB +7% at $899, SOL +10% at $142
SUI (+24%), PENGU (+19%) and LINK (+18%) led top movers
Ethereum’s Fusaka upgrade is set to launch today, expected to improve how mainnet ingests L2 data & make rollups cheaper and more scalable
Bank of Americais now recommending a crypto allocation of 1%-4% for its investment clients across Merrill Lynch & the Private Bank
Kraken agreed to acquire tokenization platform Backed Finance, aiming to accelerate adoption of tokenized stocks
Chainlink launched its “LINK Everything” initiative, a full tokenization stack showcasing CCIP, new compliance tools, data and compute services and more
Crypto-friendly Kevin Hasset is now an 85% favorite to be the new Federal Reserve Chair following Jerome Powell, jumping after Trump’s comments yesterday
Binance announced that cofounder He Yi has been appointed as Co-CEO
The UK officially created a new category of property for crypto and NFTs with the passing of its Property Act
In Corporate Treasuries / ETFs
The total spot BTC ETF volume passed $5.1B yesterday as Vanguard customers were eligible to buy for the first time
Sayloris meeting with MSCI to discuss the potential exclusion of MSTR from their index ahead of the Jan 15 decision
Hyperliquid Strategiesmerged with Sonnet Bio Therapeutics to establish an $888M HYPE DAT
Grayscale debuted the first Chainlink ETF in the IS
