Buckle up, people: We might be closer than ever to our first official Bitcoin IPO.
It was just a couple months back that it emerged that Winklevoss Capital, the investment firm/family trust founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (of early Facebook fame), had bought up approximately one percent of all the outstanding quantity of Bitcoins, the alternative digital currency — a portion that was then worth around $11 million. The firm has gone on to invest in startups that deal exclusively in the Bitcoin space, such as Bitinstant.
Today, it looks like they are looking to spread the ownership of some of that investment around to the public — with all its potential gains, and losses. An entity called “The Winklevoss Bitcoin Trust” has apparently filed for an initial public offering of 1 million shares, to raise up to $20 million in capital.
A ticker for the stock has yet to be determined. The filing explains the entity’s mission thusly:
“The Winklevoss Bitcoin Trust (Trust) will issue Winklevoss Bitcoin Shares (Shares) which represent units of fractional undivided beneficial interest in and ownership of the Trust. Math-Based Asset Services LLC is the sponsor of the Trust (Sponsor) and [TRUSTEE] is the trustee and custodian of the Trust (Trustee) using proprietary and patent-pending technology to administer the Trust. The Trust intends to issue additional Shares on a continuous basis.”
We’re reading through the filed documents, and working on getting more details from the Winklevosses directly, so this story will be updated as the information becomes more clear.
For now, check out the interview I had just a couple weeks back with Cameron and Tyler here at the TechCrunch TV studio. We talked in depth about why they’re so bullish on Bitcoin and their plans for future investments in the currency.