Bitwise CEO Hunter Horsley called the shutdown of the firm's spot Dogecoin ETF tragic, saying it exposed a gap between the investors who buy ETFs and the users of crypto brokerage apps. The fund closes within a year of its launch, even as Bitwise's Solana staking ETF holds $1.3 billion in net assets.
Bitwise's spot Dogecoin ETF (BWOW) stops trading after Oct. 14, less than a year after it launched on the NYSE in November 2025. Horsley told The Block at Digital Asset Summit 2026 Asia that the failure showed a "delta" between the audiences ETFs and crypto apps serve.
Fund assets stayed thin
The fund's total assets under management stood at about $725,870 as of Oct. 7, with monthly trading volume of $51,480 in September, according to SoSoValue data. According to The Block: "I like Dogecoin, I own Dogecoin" Horsley said, adding that the token is authentic to what it is even though it went nowhere as an ETF.
Horsley rejected the idea that Bitwise had targeted the wrong audience for BWOW. Instead, he said ETF buyers simply did not want exposure to Dogecoin, though that could change over time.
Solana staking ETF tells a different story
The contrast sits with Bitwise's Solana Staking ETF (BBSOL), which holds $1.3 billion in net assets. Horsley said the fund's staking feature, the first of its kind, helped drive demand. Buyers, he said, are betting on Solana as tokenization, stablecoins and onchain vaults expand.
Bitwise turns toward AI
Bitwise is now leaning into artificial intelligence. The firm launched a spot NEAR ETF (NRR) last week, the first fund tracking NEAR Protocol's token, and has filed two AI-related ETF applications since August. Horsley said crypto and AI come from the same roots: crypto rebuilds financial services as software, while AI lets a machine handle tasks a person used to do.
Asked what he would recommend to an investor with a five-year horizon, Horsley named the Bitwise 10 Crypto Index ETF and the Bitwise Crypto Industry Innovators ETF.
Source: The Block
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