Morgan Stanley Prices Its Bitcoin ETF at 0.14%, Undercutting Every Rival in the Market

Morgan Stanley filed an updated S-1 registration statement on Friday setting the management fee for its spot bitcoin ETF at 0.14%, which would make the Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust (MSBT) the cheapest spot bitcoin fund in the United States if regulators approve it. The fee undercuts Grayscale’s Bitcoin Mini Trust by one basis point and sits 11 basis points below BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), currently the market’s dominant product.

Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart called it a big move, predicting the fund is “likely to launch in early April.” The pricing is strategic: Morgan Stanley employs roughly 16,000 financial advisors managing $6.2 trillion in client assets. At a fee that low, none of them would face internal friction recommending the product. Fellow analyst Eric Balchunas put it bluntly, calling the bank’s advisory network “the ultimate gatekeepers of rich boomer money.”

This story is an excerpt from the Unchained Daily newsletter.

If approved, MSBT would be the first spot bitcoin ETF issued directly by a major U.S. bank, a distinction that matters for distribution. Morgan Stanley’s wealth management clients already have exposure options through third-party ETFs, but an in-house product with rock-bottom fees creates a clear incentive to consolidate. The fund would list on NYSE Arca with Coinbase and Bank of New York Mellon serving as custodians.

The filing is part of a broader institutional crypto push from the bank. Morgan Stanley submitted applications for spot Solana and staked Ether ETFs in January, appointed longtime executive Amy Oldenburg to lead its digital asset team, and applied for a national trust banking charter in February to custody digital assets and execute trades directly. In the $85 billion spot bitcoin ETF market, Morgan Stanley’s entry could trigger a fresh round of fee compression that reshapes how the biggest pools of traditional wealth access the asset.