Bloomberg reported on Aug. 12 that crypto asset manager Bitwise has cut about 14% of its staff. In an email confirmation, the company said its headcount fell from about 180 to about 155, which works out to roughly 25 positions based on those rounded figures. Bitwise did not disclose which departments were affected, what severance terms were offered, or what follow-up adjustments, if any, are planned.
Chief Executive Officer Hunter Horsley said the resized team is still the largest in Bitwise’s eight-year history. He also said the company expects to keep growing as crypto assets become more integrated into the global economy. Bitwise still says it believes in long-term growth, but its current staffing and product setup has started to tighten.
Other crypto firms have also reduced staff this year
Bitwise is not alone. Coinbase cut about 700 employees in May, equal to 14% of its global workforce, and said the move was tied to market volatility, cost control, and organizational restructuring linked to AI. On-chain data platform Dune cut 25% of staff the same month, and its CEO also referred to AI-driven efficiency. BitGo cut 15% in June and said it was concentrating resources on security, trading, stablecoins, settlement, and AI infrastructure.
Bitwise, however, has not disclosed the specific reason for its latest layoffs and has not attributed them to AI. It is also still unclear whether the staff cuts map directly to changes in its product lineup.
Disclosed client assets fell by at least $4 billion on paper
Before the workforce reduction, Bitwise had already shown a clear shift in its disclosed client asset base. In a product announcement on Feb. 3, the company said client assets exceeded $15 billion. In another announcement published on May 1, it said client assets stood at $11 billion as of April 1. Based on those two company disclosures, the gap is at least $4 billion.
Bitwise did not explain how much of that change came from token price moves, subscriptions and redemptions, or changes in reporting scope. Client assets are affected by both market value and fund flows: rising or falling crypto prices change the marked value of holdings, investor subscriptions and redemptions change the amount managed, and newly added or terminated products can alter what is counted. With only the two snapshots, those factors cannot be separated.
For that reason, the decline of at least $4 billion cannot be treated as net redemptions. Bitwise did not publish the detailed breakdown needed to make that claim.
The company’s business spans ETFs, private funds, separately managed accounts, staking, and on-chain investment products. Fee schedules and billing bases are not uniform across those product types, and Bitwise has not disclosed how the asset mix changed between the two reporting dates. What is visible is that the disclosed client asset base narrowed during that period, which puts pressure on the pool of fee-generating assets in the asset-management business.
Eight ETFs were wound down over roughly three months
Product exits came almost in the same window. On April 30, the board of Bitwise Funds Trust approved the liquidation of the Bitwise Web3 ETF and the Bitwise Trendwise BTC/ETH and Treasuries Rotation Strategy ETF. Both funds stopped trading and completed liquidation in May.
On June 30, the board approved the liquidation of six more options-income ETFs tied to Coinbase, MARA, Strategy, GameStop, Circle, and Ethereum. Those funds stopped trading in August and distributed liquidation proceeds.
The first two funds covered, respectively, Web3-themed equities and a rotation strategy across Bitcoin, Ethereum, and U.S. Treasuries. The later six relied on options linked to a single stock or to Ethereum to generate income. Together, Bitwise exited eight ETFs in about three months.
The products did not share one common investment thesis, but they did share an operational burden: each required ongoing trading, compliance, valuation, and disclosure support. Liquidation reduces the number of products that have to be maintained. The revenue effect, though, still depends on each fund’s assets and fee rate before it was closed.
New products kept coming in staking and tokenized funds
Even as those eight ETFs were leaving the lineup, Bitwise continued to add products in other areas. In April, the company launched an Avalanche ETP in Europe with an internal staking arrangement. In May, the Hyperliquid ETF went live. In June, Bitwise took over Superstate’s Crypto Carry Fund, which had more than $267 million in assets, entering the tokenized fund management business.
Those additions also create custody, staking, compliance, and distribution work. A change in product direction does not automatically mean a lighter overall operating load. It does show that Bitwise is still willing to allocate resources to newer segments, leaving layoffs and product expansion on the same operating list at the same time.
In an announcement published on June 30, Bitwise said it had 70 investment products, served more than 5,500 private wealth management teams, registered investment advisers, and family offices, and worked with more than 20 banks and broker-dealers. Maintaining that lineup requires continuing work across compliance, custody, trading support, disclosure, and client service.
With headcount down from 180 to 155, a smaller team now has to manage the remaining product base. Bitwise has not said which roles, if any, were tied to product changes, and it has not disclosed any one-time layoff charges.
Looked at together, the concentrated ETF liquidations and the new launches point to a visible shift in mix. Web3-themed funds and options-income strategies built around single underlying names are being removed, while products that directly track crypto assets, add staking yield, or move fund interests on-chain through tokenization are still receiving investment.