Are New Spot Bitcoin ETFs About to Come onto the Market?

Plus, all about the CBDA - the new professional designation in crypto

Ric Edelman: It's Monday, August 21st. And you know in addition to this podcast that we do every day, The Truth About Your Future, where we talk about not only crypto, we talk about health and wellness, longevity, retirement security and all the subjects really that are going to determine how you live your life in the future. Not only you personally, but society as a whole. This podcast is really only part of what I spend a lot of my time doing. You may well be familiar with the fact that I have a sister company to the truth about your future. My sister company is called DACFP, the Digital Assets Council of Financial Professionals. I created DACFP, oh 7 or 8 years ago, to provide crypto education to both financial professionals and to investors and consumers. What I recognized a long time ago - and I've been involved in Bitcoin and the crypto community since 2012. I've discovered a long time ago two fundamental facts.  

The first is that blockchain and digital assets represents one of the most significant innovations for global commerce since the invention of the Internet. And second, most people are unaware of this fact and as a result, are not taking advantage of the technological opportunities, nor are they taking advantage of the investment opportunities. This is a particular concern for financial advisors because, let's face it, two thirds of American investors work with a financial advisor. You're not out there looking for your own investments. You're relying on your advisor to give you those recommendations.  

But if advisors don't know about Bitcoin and blockchain and digital assets broadly, then the advisor isn't able to give you advice and recommendations and services about that.  

So I created DACFP a long time ago to provide the level of education that financial advisors need, and we launched several years ago the certificate in blockchain and digital assets. This course has been taken by thousands of financial professionals in 37 countries. It is the oldest and still largest education program that leads to a certificate. And now I am very excited to tell you that our certificate course in blockchain and digital assets is now listed by FINRA as a professional designation. This course now offers you the CBDA designation. So if you're a financial advisor and you are looking to get CE credits, our course offers you as many as 18 continuing education credits. Plus you earn the right to list yourself as holding the CBDA to the Certified in Blockchain and Digital Assets Professional designation listed on FINRA's database of professional designations.  

Our course is online. It is self-study and it offers you a world class faculty. We have five tracks in the course. There's a program exclusively for financial advisors, another one for back office executives, another one for investors, consumers and students, a fourth for crypto professionals, and will soon be launching a fifth for professionals and investors who live and work outside the United States. The content is taught by a world class faculty, including Scott Stornetta, the co-inventor of blockchain technology, and Anders Brownworth of the Boston Federal Reserve.  

When you complete the program, you'll have the vital understanding you need of blockchain technology, its investment thesis and investment opportunities and how as an advisor you can incorporate this new asset class into your practice management, including regulatory compliance and tax issues as well. 

And to celebrate the fact that we have now attained certification status with FINRA, we are now inviting you to enroll in the course and if you do so by the end of the month, you'll get a 20% discount. Simply use discount code CBDA 23 when you enroll, the enrollment link is in the show notes where you can learn a lot more about the course, the full course content, the list of all the faculty members. Some folks binge the entire course in a weekend. The average student takes ten days to complete it. They do basically one module a night over a couple of weeks, and you'll be really excited about the program. It's a lot of fun. It gets rave reviews and you'll gain a huge new level of understanding about one of the most important technological innovations in global commerce of the century. So if you haven't already checked out our certification in blockchain and digital assets, now's your chance to do that.  

I also want to mention that there is a big buzz in the crypto community right now because there is the distinct possibility that the SEC is going to approve spot Bitcoin ETFs very, very soon.  

It could happen any day, any time over the next 6 or 8 months. And this has the industry all really focused. There's a simple reason for this. Most financial advisors, three out of four say that they aren't currently recommending bitcoin to their clients, but they will as soon as there's a Bitcoin ETF available to provide their clients. There are now nine of these applications pending before the SEC, and the rumor mill has it that the SEC is going to say yes to at least some of them. They may say yes tomorrow, sometime over the next several months.  

You need to understand the significance of this, because if we have three quarters of financial advisors saying, I haven't yet been recommending Bitcoin to my clients, but I will when this ETF becomes available. Imagine the hundreds of millions of dollars that could very quickly flood into the Bitcoin marketplace when this ETF suddenly becomes available.  

So I've written a new white paper and I'm making it available to you for free. The paper is called What You Need to Know About Spot Bitcoin ETFs. The paper begins with a quick snapshot that you very quickly get a fast summary. I explain why BlackRock, the world's largest money manager, filed an application to launch a Bitcoin ETF. What makes these new Bitcoin ETF applications different from all the prior applications that have been filed over the past eight years that the SEC has all said no to? What makes these new applications different and what approval of these new applications would mean for investors.  

I also explain the risks of investing in a spot Bitcoin ETF and a little bit of a tease. The most important thing you need to know this paper is available to you as a financial advisor or investor. It's available free. Just go to DACFP.com. The link is in the show notes. I encourage you to read this paper today before the SEC issues its verdict about these applications. 

And finally, you might have noticed that I have a new sponsor called Prisidio. I've gotten a bunch of emails from listeners about Prisidio, so I thought I would give you a little more information about them. You know, we're all grown-ups now, and that means we've got to do some grown up stuff. That's not always fun, but, you know, it's important. We buy homes and cars. We got to buy insurance. We start contributing to our retirement accounts at work. We've got bank accounts and brokerage accounts. We write a will, we get a trust, we get powers of attorney. We've got birth certificates and marriage certificates. We've got children and their birth certificates. We have medical records and employment records and passports and deeds and car titles and college diplomas. All of those legal documents need to be safely stored away.  

But somewhere that we're not going to forget, where we put it, where we can easily get access to it. We also know it's all safe and secure here. And our new digital world means we don't have to fuss with paperwork anymore like we used to. We can convert all our documents into digital files and we can store them in a secure digital vault. When you've got digital copies of all your documents, that means you've immediately got backups. You don't have to worry that something will get lost or misplaced or damaged or destroyed in a fire or a flood or some other natural disaster. With climate change that's becoming a really big deal. One out of ten homes were impacted by natural disasters last year. Wildfires have destroyed 100,000 homes and businesses in the past 15 years. And we all saw the devastation in Maui as the most recent example. 

But when everything is digital, you can access your documents from anywhere using a smartphone, and you can secure everything using encryption and protection with passwords, biometrics, two factor authentication and other methods, and everything is green as well. No more need for paper or toner. You save money and you help protect the environment. But you've got to be careful when you go digital. You want to make sure your documents are safe and that you can access and share your documents with anybody you want anytime you want. And from anywhere you are.  

Sharing documents is a big part of digital document storage. You deal with paperwork all the time with family members and friends as well as your doctors, your lawyer, your real estate agent, your accountant, your financial adviser. You want them to have access to certain documents, but only certain documents. All of this, everything I've just described is what Prisidio does for you. You can easily keep track of everything you value and all the important places in your life, both physical and digital. You might have some stuff in a safe deposit box. Your boat might be in a storage facility for the winter. Your photos might be on iCloud. Prisidio helps you identify where everything is and helps you with all these places with your family and your trusted advisor. I'm not just talking about legal documents like your insurance policies. I'm also talking about your classic car or your grandmother's pearl necklace. Prisidio's mobile app lets you easily create a digital record of everything that you value. You just take a photo of it and add some text. Prisidio even lets you set reminders so you never miss deadlines. Say for renewal of an insurance policy or dates for certain travel or your next vet appointment for your dog. It's very low cost and you can try Prisidio for free. I think you'll be very surprised at how inexpensive it is. Check them out@prisidio.com. Prisidio.com. Prisidio.  

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