Osprey Readies SOL Fund as Solana Attracts Institutional Interest

Osprey Funds has readied a private SOL fund for wealthy investors, signaling growing institutional interest in the Solana network’s booming native token.

The fund, called the Osprey Solana Trust, was registered with U.S. securities regulators Tuesday. It didn't have any sales as of press time and is open only to accredited investors, which means that retail traders are shut out for now.

That could change, though. Osprey is “seeking approval” for its Solana Trust to trade on the same over-the-counter marketplace that its bitcoin trust does, documents reviewed by CoinDesk show.

The trust appears to be the first private SOL investment vehicle in the U.S.

It comes as a growing number of investors take interest in Solana, whose SOL token is up over 4,500% this year. It’s nearly doubled in value in the last week and now touts a market cap of over $20 billion.

Read more: Solana, Terra Hit All-Time Highs as Markets Disregard Last Week’s DeFi Hacks

Osprey has been working on its own Solana trust since at least mid-June, according to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission records. Rival fund manager Grayscale also signaled in June that its own Solana fund was in the works. (Grayscale is owned by CoinDesk parent company Digital Currency Group.)

Trust products such as Osprey’s give Wall Street types a way to gain exposure to crypto prices without directly holding the underlying tokens. Instead, they give their cash to an investment vehicle that does the buying and holding on their behalf – usually for a fee.

Osprey won't begin charging a 2.5% management fee until 2023 in a sign of the competition for institutional crypto products, according to the documents reviewed by CoinDesk. Crypto exchange Coinbase is handling custodial duties, and Theorem Fund Services is the administrator.

Osprey did not immediately return a comment to CoinDesk.