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Winklevoss twins eye up NASDAQ: Publicly traded Bitcoin fund... what could go wrong?

Filing comes 2 days after SEC warns on virtual currency

The Winklevoss twins have set out plans to list their Bitcoin trust exchange on the NASDAQ to create what would be the world's first publicly traded cryptocurrency biz – if it were approved.

The news comes just two days after the SEC issued an investor alert warning the public about the risks of virtual currency investments.

In an amended filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, the monozygotes said the IPO of the Winklevoss Bitcoin Trust would create a total of one million shares for their Bitcoin Trust exchange traded fund (ETF).

The initial price per share in the filing is $20.09, and the pair estimate a total yield of just over $20m.

However, this figure is likely to be a confusing, because the twins suggested each NASDAQ share will also be worth one-fifth of a Bitcoin - which fluctuates wildly in price. At the current price of $441.82, this would amount to just over $88 a share.

Perhaps the world's biggest Bitcoin investors, the brothers own about one per cent of the all the digital funny money currently in existence today, which amounts to about $50m.

The Winklevei first filed their plans for a "Bitcoin trust" last year.

They also monitor the price of Bitcoin on their Winkdex index.

A British dev told us earlier this year that the twins had "taken influence" from his own price tracker. ®

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