Canada’s IGM May Launch Bitcoin, Ether Products in 2022
Canada’s IGM May Launch Bitcoin, Ether Products in 2022
(Bloomberg) -- IGM Financial Inc., the Canadian wealth and asset manager, is “actively considering” launching crypto products next year, the firm’s chief executive officer said.
Internal discussions on whether and when to launch Bitcoin and Ether products are ongoing, James O’Sullivan said in an interview. In February, Canada approved North America’s first exchange-traded fund that invests directly in physically-settled Bitcoin, warming to the products ahead of U.S. regulators.
IGM ended the third quarter with about C$700 million ($563 million) in unallocated capital, giving it “real firepower” if it wants to repurchase shares or make acquisitions -- particularly Canadian wealth managers focused on wealthy households, O’Sullivan said.
The Winnipeg, Manitoba-based company has investments in online brokerage Wealthsimple Inc., Greenchip Financial Corp., a Toronto-based boutique that’s focused on environmentally-sound investments, and Northleaf Capital Partners Ltd., a manager of private equity.
Another minority investment that’s making a contribution is IGM’s 14% stake in fund manager China Asset Management Co., which it bought in 2017. IGM’s share of China AMC’s earnings was C$17 million in the third quarter, 62% more than in the same period in 2020.
The Chinese asset manager invests across the world’s second-largest economy. That exposes it to industries that have been subject to new regulation, O’Sullivan said, “but that hasn’t slowed down their growth at all.”
IGM’s assets under management grew 1.2% during the quarter to C$265.2 billion.
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