Bitwise XRP Carry Trade Reveals 97.48% Hedge Coverage
Bitwise has revealed a rare look into its institutional XRP carry trade. The Bitwise Crypto Carry Fund, or USCC, paired XRP held in custody with an almost equal short position in September Coinbase XRP futures. This structure was 97.48% matched by quantity, leaving limited exposure to a parallel move in XRP while positioning the fund to collect the premium between futures and spot.
The disclosure shows that XRP served as inventory for a near-market-neutral basis trade. The remaining 271,438.36 XRP retains direct price exposure. This residual risk is present even with the high level of hedge coverage.
The implied-yield label on Bitwise's holdings table showed a 14.57% annualized rate, which was derived from a 0.91% premium between futures and spot. This premium can be monetized through cash-and-carry strategies, where a fund buys the asset and sells a future trading above it.
The USCC XRP leg had a notional value of $14,255,218, while the September Coinbase futures short had a notional value of -$14,022,442. The spread between these two values was roughly 1.2 cents, or 0.91%, above spot.