Morgan Stanley has launched the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust (MSBT) on NYSE Arca under the ticker MSBT, becoming the first major U.S. bank to issue a spot Bitcoin ETF under its own name. The fund began trading on April 8 and carries an annual fee of 0.14%, the lowest among spot Bitcoin ETFs currently available in the U.S. market.
Lowest fee in the U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF market
MSBT enters the market below all major rivals on cost. According to the source material, BlackRock’s IBIT charges 0.25%, Fidelity’s FBTC also charges 0.25%, and Grayscale’s Bitcoin Mini Trust charges 0.15%. The article notes that for an institutional allocation of $10 million, the 11-basis-point difference versus IBIT would equal $11,000 in annual savings.
The product holds physical bitcoin and does not use leverage or derivatives, aiming to track the spot market directly. Coinbase Custody is responsible for cold storage of the bitcoin, while BNY Mellon serves as cash custodian and administrator. The seed basket launched with 50,000 shares and about $1 million in initial capital.
A house-branded option for Morgan Stanley’s advisor network
Before this launch, Morgan Stanley advisors could recommend third-party Bitcoin ETFs from firms such as BlackRock and Fidelity. MSBT changes that by giving the bank its own branded spot Bitcoin ETF. The source says Morgan Stanley has about 16,000 financial advisors overseeing roughly $9.3 trillion in client assets, creating an internal distribution channel for the new fund and allowing management fees to stay within the bank.
BlackRock still leads the category by a wide margin. The material states that IBIT holds around $70.6 billion in assets and accounts for about 45% of the entire U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF market. Morgan Stanley is not expected to match that liquidity immediately, but its advisor base gives MSBT a built-in path to reach wealth management clients.
Part of a wider digital asset expansion
The MSBT launch sits within a broader crypto strategy. The source says Morgan Stanley has also filed separately for an Ethereum trust and a Solana trust, applied to the OCC for a National Trust Bank Charter covering digital asset custody and staking, and plans to introduce retail crypto trading through E*Trade before the end of the first half of 2026. The planned offering would include Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana.
The article also points out that Morgan Stanley published a research note in 2017 suggesting Bitcoin’s true value could be zero. It now operates the lowest-cost spot Bitcoin ETF in the U.S. market. Early inflows into MSBT are likely to be watched closely as the fund begins trading.