Last checked at 
* Hires Colleen Sullivan for newly launched crypto division
CMT
Digital
* Sullivan to lead private, venture investments
* Turnover on top exchange led by institutional investors
(Recasts, adds quotes, details)
By Saikat Chatterjee and Simon Jessop
LONDON, Sept 13 (Reuters) - Hedge fund Brevan Howard said on
Monday that it was expanding its crypto business, the latest
sign that institutional interest in the asset class is gaining
momentum.
Brevan, more famous for its bets on macroeconomic trends,
has been among the most high-profile of major hedge funds moving
into the world of crypto trading, known for its volatile markets
and scope for outsize gains.
The asset manager said it would launch a new unit, BH
Digital, to manage cryptocurrency and digital assets. It said it
would also hire Colleen Sullivan, currently CEO of the digital
arm of trading firm CMT, to lead private and venture investments
in crypto.
Brevan's expansion comes on the back of other high-profile
money managers venturing into this space in recent months. Hedge
fund manager Paul Tudor Jones has invested in bitcoin while Man
Group trades bitcoin futures.
An annual report published by PriceWaterHouseCoopers,
Alternative Investment Management Association and Elwood Asset
Management found total assets under management of crypto hedge
funds globally nearly doubled to $3.8 billion in 2020 from US$2
billion in the previous year.
The rise in institutional interest comes as a wider range of
cryptocurrencies become available while bitcoin and
ethereum, the world's best known coins, are trading
well below their record highs.
"What was initially seen as something of a fad now appears
to be becoming a more permanent structure of the financial
landscape and this has started to see what were initially fringe
financial instruments moving to become more mainstream and very
much forcing the institutional interest we are now seeing," said
Stuart Cole, head macroeconomist at London-based Equiti Capital.
The rise in institutional interest has rippled over to the
trading space. Eurex, Deutsche Boerse's derivatives exchange,
launched bitcoin futures on Monday to feed on the growing
interest.
Coinbase, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the
world, says institutional interest in trading cryptocurrencies
has soared this year.
In its second quarter letter to shareholders, Coinbase said
turnover of cryptocurrencies hit a record $462 billion in the
three months to June. Of this amount, $317 billion was traded by
institutional investors and the rest by retail clients.
In the year-ago period, total turnover was $28 billion, $17
billion of which was institutional trading.
While hedge funds and exchanges have scrambled to capture
trading revenues, global banks have been relatively slow to
latch on to the trend, with their wealth management clients
largely pushing them to offer cryptocurrency trading.
Citigroup Inc is considering offering bitcoin futures
trading for some institutional clients while Standard Chartered
has formed a newly minted research division for
cryptocurrencies.
(Reporting by Simon Jessop and Saikat Chatterjee; Additional
reporting by Huw Jones; Editing by Rachel Armstrong and
Bernadette Baum)
