Buying Bitcoin
22 Pages Posted: 28 Mar 2019
Date Written: February 1, 2019
Abstract
Using live trade execution data from an institutional money manager, we measure the real-world costs and challenges a trader faces when demanding significant liquidity of Bitcoin. We provide a novel characterization of the market to purchase digital assets across exchanges and over-the-counter (“OTC”) dealers. We find that most displayed digital asset liquidity on exchanges is not readily accessible to institutional investors. However, by purchasing digital assets OTC from regulated counterparties, institutional investors can achieve comparable or better execution quality while fulfilling their fiduciary obligations.
Keywords: bitcoin, cryptocurrency, digital assets, trading, microstructure, institutional investor, bitcoin exchange
JEL Classification: G12, E4, G23
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation