QR Asset is launching today (8) the world’s first index fund (ETF) that invests 100% in decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols. The listing is on B3. The company listed QDFI11 without announcing prior funding, and thus, put its product on the market a few days before competitor Hashdex, which has funding open for a similar ETF.
The company and Hashdex have a cat and mouse race in ETFs on B3. Last October, QR Asset announced that it would have the DeFi ETF. Hashdex announced theirs in January as the world’s first. The expected end of funding, that is, reserve quotas by investors, is this Friday (11th) and the launch is on the next 15th. The QDFI11 quota costs R$ 10 and the Hashdex quota is in the range of BRL 50.
QDFI11 tracks the Bloomberg Galaxy DeFi Index and has an annual management fee of 0.9%. Hashdex’s DEFI11 tracks the CF DeFi Composite Index – Modified Market Cap Weight by CF Bencharmarks, one of the world’s largest crypto index creators. company specializing in indices. And it has an administration fee of 1.3%.
Brazil is one of the few countries that has crypto EFTs on the exchange. And with those DeFi ones, you’ll have seven. The US, for example, only has one. Both QR Asset and Hashdex are capitalizing on the growth prospects of DeFi usage. Even the Central Bank of Brazil, in its studies of the digital real, foresees a connection with DeFi.
In DeFi, blockchain smart contracts allow direct trading, without intermediaries such as banks or brokers. Thus, they tend to be faster, more transparent and cheaper. According to the website DeFi Pulse, there are US$ 86.7 billion (about R$ 480 billion) allocated to this segment. According to QR Asset, the value traded on decentralized exchanges is in the range of $800 billion, according to estimates.
For investors, ETFs create an ease for exposing themselves to cryptos, as they can invest in shares directly through the bank. They also don’t need to create and manage their digital wallets. However, it is always necessary to remember that these are risk products and that they follow indices, therefore, the eventual rises and falls of these references.
Bloomberg Galaxy DeFi Index includes nine finance protocols
decentralized. So, in this list there are Uniswap (UNI), Aaave Decentralized Lending Pools (AAVE), MakerDao (MKR), Compound (COMP), Yearn.finance (YFI), SushiSwap (SUSHI), 0X (ZRX), Synthetix (SNX) and
Curve (CRV).
This list can, but all assets must have trading and custody by regulated institutions. They must also have at least three sources of
price approved by Digital Asset Research and meet eligibility criteria for three consecutive months before being included in the index.
According to Fernando Carvalho, CEO of QR Capital, “bitcoin and ethereum ETFs were just the entrance to a much richer and more diverse investment universe”.