Through an unexpected airdrop, fund manager Blackrock receives more than $20,000 in RUNE tokens, the new protocol in vogue on Bitcoin. This discovery raises several questions about the management of digital assets within traditional ETFs.
Blackrock: a surprise airdrop of Runes tokens thanks to its own Bitcoin ETF
According to on-chain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence, 2 Blackrock Bitcoin wallets reportedly hold over $20,000 in RSIC-GENESIS-RUNE, the token for the new Rune protocol.
It was via social networks that Arkham Intelligence revealed this unusual information last Thursday. The company identified 1,887,240 RSIC-GENESIS-RUNE tokens on 2 Bitcoin addresses associated with Blackrock’s IBIT ETFs. These tokens were distributed via an airdrop and their combined value currently exceeds $20,000.
Bet you didn’t know: Blackrock has received ☻$20,000 in Runes token airdrops across 2 of their ETF wallets:
bc1qnl4937a7wu5xmt40rv5vxzvpr27004zs8ae3da
1MWHaNS38V2zDpKHQiPryAB1CVZ9xNiXeXHow did that happen? pic.twitter.com/cj2lAoSxEP
– Arkham (@ArkhamIntel) April 25, 2024
” Bet you didn’t know: Blackrock has received over $20,000 in RUNE tokens via an airdrop on two of its ETF portfolios. These tokens were entered into the Bitcoin halving block and distributed earlier this week. “
Currently, the RUNE token is trading at around 16.2 satoshis, or around $0.01. At this price, the total market capitalization of the RSIC-GENESIS-RUNE token is $220.14 million.
An involuntary possession linked to Ordinals
According to Arkham’s data, these Ordinals were sent from a Coinbase Prime hot wallet. Initially, they had been airdropped to Swissborg due to the presence of other Ordinals collections in their wallets. As a reminder, the distribution rules for certain airdrops take into account the possession of specific assets.
This latest episode comes shortly after the discovery of an Ordinals Bitcoin Puppet in Ark Invest’s ARKB ETF. Last week, several English-language media also reported the presence of an Ordinal Speculum Aeternum inscription in Blackrock’s portfolios on April 25, 2024.
Blackrock has yet to comment on this discovery. It is therefore unclear whether the world’s largest fund manager intends to keep these RSIC-GENESIS-RUNE tokens, or whether it plans to dispose of them.
The unintentional nature of this airdrop raises questions about the management of digital assets within traditional ETFs.
Indeed, ETFs are designed to offer simplified exposure to underlying asset classes, and the presence of unexpected assets such as NFTs or Ordinals may call into question their transparency and predictability. It remains to be seen what the long-term implications of these findings will be for the ETF industry and its interaction with the cryptocurrency ecosystem.