UK investment manager sells off half BTC holdings after $750M win

United Kingdom-based Ruffer Investment Management has made more than $750 million from its Bitcoin investment in less than two months, but it has decreased the size of its holdings.

According to a report from British news outlet The Telegraph, Ruffer saw “immediate fireworks” after investing roughly 2.5% of its assets into Bitcoin (BTC) in November 2020, resulting in millions of dollars in gains as the price of the crypto asset rose past $20,000 and on to a new all-time high of more than $42,000 in January. Rather than HODLing it all, however, the firm reported that it had sold roughly half its BTC holdings.

"The 2.5% allocation we made in November across all our funds, which totalled around $600 million — this has more than doubled so we decided to take out our ‘book cost’ and take $650 million in profits," said Ruffer co-manager Duncan MacInnes. "We still have around $700 million left in and are currently up by $750 million overall."

MacInnes said Ruffer was initially skeptical about investing in Bitcoin in 2017 but admitted the circumstances had changed in the last four years, with many people turning to digital solutions accelerated by the pandemic. He said retail investors are “desperate for alternative safe haven assets” and institutions are buying into the crypto asset as well.

"The economic environment for Bitcoin right now could not be better."

In November 2020, Ruffer called adding Bitcoin to its Multi-Strategies Fund a defensive move against the “continued devaluation” of fiat money. The firm reduced its exposure to gold and invested roughly 2.5% of its assets into BTC. Ruffer chairman Jonathan Ruffer later called Bitcoin a “seemingly non-sensical asset, but one that makes absolute sense for how we see the world.”

At time of publication, the price of Bitcoin is $36,816, having risen 6% in the last 24 hours.