Cathie Wood's Ark Invest gets behind a bitcoin futures ETF, stepping up its crypto involvement

Cathie Wood, founder, CEO and CIO at ARK Investment Management, is Cathie. ARK Investment Management
Cathie Wood's Ark is now a Bitcoin Futures ETF, according to an SEC filing on Wednesday.

Alpha Architect filed the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin Futures Strategy ETF and listed 21Shares as an investment sub-adviser.

Analysts believe that the filing assigns the ticker ARKA to the filing, which is a positive sign for future SEC approval.

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Cathie Wood's Ark Invest has taken a leap into crypto with the addition of its name to a bitcoin futures exchange traded fund.

According to Alpha Architect, the ticker ARKA will be used by the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin Futures Strategy ETF. As a sub-adviser, Crypto firm 21Shares is listed.

Ark Investment Management will offer marketing support, according to the filing.

Cathie Wood isn't the first to venture into crypto ETFs. In September, one of Ark's funds granted clearance to purchase Canadian bitcoin exchange-traded funds. Wood, a Bitcoin bull, has spoken highly of the cryptocurrency's ability to protect against inflation.

According to Eric Balchunas (an ETF analyst at Bloomberg), the Ark-backed ETF's assigned ticker indicates that the SEC could soon move on granting the green light for its launch.

"ARK just applied for a bitcoin futures ETF via whiteAlpha Architect white Label (huge win) He posted on Twitter Wednesday that ARK already has the ticker $ARKA (yet an additional good sign SEC will approve).

Ark is now part of a group of Wall Street players who are trying to get approval from US regulators for a crypto-focused ETF. Bloomberg reports that four of them could be approved by US regulators before the end the month. These include the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF and Invesco Bitcoin Strategy ETF. VanEck Bitcoin Strategy ETF is also included.

Volt Equity's exchange traded fund was approved by the SEC last week. It is comprised of stocks that have bitcoin exposure, such as mining companies. This fund is the closest to a bitcoin ETF.

Bitcoin's market capitalization has returned to $1 trillion due to the prospect of an ETF. The bitcoin price rose above $50,000 because of the prospect of such an ETF. According to CoinShares, investors invested $225 million last week in assets that were backed by bitcoin. This is the highest amount of money in seven months due to the positive outlook for ETFs.