Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) has moved one step closer towards launching its first exchange-traded fund (ETF) linked to Bitcoin (BTC) by filing the prospectus that details the structure of the fund.

An ETF is an investment vehicle that pools capital from different investors to track the performance of an underlying asset, an index, or a basket of assets. It gets traded on a traditional stock exchange.

A crypto ETF is a type of investment fund that offers investors indirect exposure to cryptocurrency without directly buying or holding virtual assets.

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As reported earlier, the 91-year-old bank filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to launch its Bitcoin and Solana (SOL) ETFs on Jan. 6.

The Wall Street giant's amendment to form S-1 filed with the SEC on March 4 mentions Coinbase Custody (Nasdaq: COIN) and the Bank of New York Mellon (NYSE: BK) as the Bitcoin custodians, which will safeguard the fund's holdings.

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As per the filing, the custodians will hold Bitcoin in offline cold storage vaults, which means private keys to the vaults are offline and are disconnected from the internet so that the funds do not get stolen during potential cyber attacks.

The Bitcoin custodians are not Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)-insured but carry insurance provided by private insurance carriers. Though custody insurance exists, it is shared across customers and will not be able to cover all losses in case of theft.

Morgan Stanley will value the Bitcoin ETF's shares based on a pricing benchmark, an aggregated index of executed trading activity across major spot trading exchanges.

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This story was originally published by TheStreet on Mar 4, 2026, where it first appeared in the MARKETS section. Add TheStreet as a Preferred Source by clicking here.