T. Rowe Price, one of the largest old-school fund managers in the US with roots dating back to 1937, is finally dipping his toes into crypto, but not just with another Bitcoin tracker.
An Oct. 22 SEC filing reveals The $1.8 trillion company wants to run a fund with a “diversified basket of crypto assets,” focusing on 5 to 15 coins with a different weighting than the usual market cap approach.
They aim to beat the FTSE Crypto US Listed Index (the top ten listed tokens) while maintaining the freedom to zig when others zag.
This puts T. Rowe in a small club of big players who design products around active management rather than simple exposure.
It’s a departure from what BlackRock did with its spot Bitcoin ETF (now about $90 billion in assets) and Fidelity’s $23 billion fund.
Those are just passive Bitcoin channels; T. Rowe’s approach is more like an equity fund, where managers try to outperform by making smart allocation choices across multiple assets.
This is T. Rowe’s attempt to restart growth.
The Baltimore company has seen money flow out of its mutual funds for years, many of which have failed to keep up with passive benchmarks.
Since 2021, they have lost more than $67 billion in assets under management despite the broader market rally. CEO Rob Sharps is under pressure to modernize the 87-year-old company’s approach, especially as younger investors increasingly bypass traditional funds.
Crypto offers them a new battlefield where active management may still work. They have already built the trading infrastructure, with “end-to-end capabilities” for custody and execution.
T. Rowe has historically been more conservative than peers like BlackRock, and they were noticeably absent from the first wave of spot Bitcoin ETFs. This makes their multi-coin approach even more surprising.
The FTSE Crypto US Listed Index currently includes Bitcoin and Ethereum alongside alts like Solana and XRP, giving an indication of what the portfolio could look like. Their square root weighting means that smaller assets receive proportionately larger allocations than in typical market cap models. For example, if Solana represents 5% of the crypto market cap, it could be closer to 15-20% allocation under this model.
Why T. Rowe’s crypto pivot matters now
This matters because every major ETF to date has just solidified Bitcoin’s dominance. A multi-asset approach could finally spread liquidity more evenly across the top tier of crypto.
This structure also shows how institutions are gradually accepting altcoins within the confines of regulations. By sticking to ‘listed’ assets, the index essentially limits the fund to tokens traded on US exchanges, providing legal cover and expanding options.
For investors, this means getting exposure to assets like Solana, Cardano or XRP without dealing with nebulous offshore products.
The implications for the crypto markets are profound. Current institutional flows primarily fuel Bitcoin liquidity, with smaller trickles to Ethereum.
If approved, T. Rowe’s fund could create more balanced institutional demand across multiple assets. With T. Rowe managing over $1.8 trillion, even a small allocation percentage could represent billions in potential inflows into altcoins.
There’s a bigger strategy here: active multi-asset ETFs could shape the next wave of crypto money flows. BlackRock and Fidelity built empires on the simplicity of Bitcoin; T. Rowe is betting that people now want a professional opinion on what comes next.
The fund would test whether crypto can evolve from a single-asset play to a managed allocation, similar to how large institutions diversify across sectors.
The timing also matches the changing political winds.
With Trump supporting digital assets and the CME preparing for 24-hour crypto futures trading next year, the traditional financial world is making more room for digital assets. T. Rowe’s move fits exactly into this trend: crypto is shifting from marginal speculation to a legitimate asset class.
For retail investors, T. Rowe’s entry offers something different: professional risk management in a notoriously volatile space.
Instead of trying to time individual altcoins, they could potentially benefit from T. Rowe’s century of investing experience applied to the crypto market. The fund would essentially function as a “crypto portfolio in a box,” potentially attracting investors who find individual token selection overwhelming.
Industry veterans may recognize this as part of a broader pattern. First came Bitcoin-only vehicles, then Ethereum. Multi-asset funds represent the third wave of institutional crypto adoption.
The next logical steps would be sector-focused crypto ETFs (such as ‘DeFi-only’ or ‘Web3 Infrastructure’), eventually followed by thematic crypto funds that mirror the way traditional ETFs evolved.
Whether this is the start of an ‘altcoin ETF season’ depends on how regulators handle multi-asset exposure. But the precedent is there. If T. Rowe wins approval, others will follow with their own mix of liquidity, custodian partners and index rules.
Franklin Templeton and Invesco are reportedly keeping a close eye on it as their own multi-asset framework nears completion.
What started as a Bitcoin ETF arms race could evolve into a competition over who defines crypto’s broader investable universe, potentially reshaping the way capital flows into digital assets for decades to come.
