As recently as May 2021, Binance was under investigation by the U.S. government for tax fraud and money laundering, according to reporting by Bloomberg.
However, while there are some organisations that accept it as currency, others shy away due to Bitcoin’s dramatic price swings. Driven largely by speculation, the price per Bitcoin rose sharply from $1,151 in January 2017, to an all-time high of $19,783 in December the same year.* It then dropped to below $7,000 by February 2018 and rallied again to around $11,000 over a matter of days, before plunging once more to trade below $4,000. Subsequently, one of the key characteristics of Bitcoin that traders should understand is its potential for extreme volatility.

“The manual burns, alongside the company having a pretty large stake in the coins, just speaks to me of a manipulation risk,” said Jasper Lawler, head of research at London Capital Group, an online brokerage firm offering cryptocurrency derivatives. “Whenever there’s some sort of mechanism to stop selling, that’s a bit of a warning sign.”
However, investing in a crypto ETF, like BITO, still carries the same risk as any crypto investment. It’s still a speculative and volatile investment. If you’re not willing to lose the money you put into crypto by purchasing on an exchange, then you shouldn’t put it in a crypto fund either. Carefully consider if you’re willing to take on the risk of having cryptocurrency in your portfolio at all.