Except for the following new Risk Factor, there have been no material changes to the Risk Factors last reported under Part I, Item 1A of the registrant’s Annual Report on Form 10-K.
−Removed: The Trust faces risks related to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19)
−Removed: outbreak, which could negatively impact the value of the Trust’s holdings and significantly disrupt its operations.
−Removed: The novel coronavirus (“COVID-19”)
−Removed: will in the short-term, and may over the longer term, adversely affect the economies and financial markets of many countries, resulting in an economic downturn that may adversely affect demand for digital assets generally and impact the value of, and demand for, the digital assets held by the Trust.
−Removed: Although the magnitude of the impact of the COVID-19
−Removed: outbreak or the occurrence of other epidemics or pandemics on the digital assets held by the Trust remains uncertain, the continued spread of COVID-19
−Removed: and the imposition of related public health measures and travel and business restrictions have resulted in, and will continue to result in, increased volatility and uncertainty in the Digital Asset Markets.
−Removed: In addition, we rely on third party service providers to perform certain functions essential to the operation of the Trust.
+Added: The Trust faces risks related to COVID-19 outbreak, which could negatively impact the value of the Trust’s holdings and significantly disrupt its operations.
+Added: An outbreak of infectious respiratory illness caused by a novel coronavirus known as SARS-CoV-19 (“COVID-19”) was first detected in China in December 2019 and has now been spread globally.
+Added: This outbreak has resulted in travel restrictions, closed international borders, enhanced health screenings at ports of entry and elsewhere, disruption of and delays in healthcare service preparation and delivery, prolonged quarantines, cancellations, lower consumer demand, layoffs, defaults and other significant economic impacts, as well as general concern and uncertainty.
+Added: COVID-19 has had and will likely continue to have serious adverse effects on the economies and financial markets of many countries, resulting in an economic downturn that may adversely affect demand for digital assets generally and impact the value of, and demand for, the digital assets held by the Trust.
+Added: Although the duration and magnitude of the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak or the occurrence of other epidemics or pandemics on the digital assets held by the Trust remains uncertain, the continued spread of COVID-19 and the imposition of related public health measures and travel and business restrictions have resulted in, and will continue to result in, increased volatility and uncertainty in economies and financial markets of many countries, which may include the Digital Asset Markets.
+Added: For example, digital asset prices, including BTC, decreased significantly in the first quarter of 2020 amidst broader market declines as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak and increased significantly again in the second quarter of 2020.
+Added: In connection with the volatility in the broader market, the price for the Shares as reported by OTCQX also experienced volatility and for the first quarter of 2020 ranged from $5.54 per Share to $13.48 per Share.
+Added: In the second quarter of 2020, the price of the Shares as reported by OTCQX had recovered consistent with the broader market, and ranged between $6.50 per Share and $12.30 per Share.
+Added: Governmental authorities and regulators throughout the world have, in the past, responded to major economic disruptions with a variety of fiscal and monetary policy changes, such as quantitative easing, new monetary programs and lower interest rates.
+Added: An unexpected or quick reversal of these policies, or the ineffectiveness of these policies, is likely to increase volatility in economies and financial market generally, and could specifically increase volatility in the Digital Asset Markets, which could adversely affect the value of BTC and the price of the Shares.
+Added: In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the operations of many businesses.
+Added: In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Sponsor has made certain adjustments to its operations, including moving all of its employees to a remote working situation as of March 31, 2020.While the operations of the Sponsor and the Trust have not been materially impacted as of the date hereof, there can be no assurance that further developments with respect to the COVID-19 pandemic will not have such an impact.
+Added: Moreover, the Trust relies on third party service providers to perform certain functions essential to the operation of the Trust.
Any disruptions to the Trust’s or the Trust’s service providers’ business operations resulting from business restrictions, quarantines or restrictions on the ability of personnel to perform their jobs could have an adverse impact on the Trust’s ability to access critical services and would be disruptive to the operation of the Trust.
+Added: The COVID-19 outbreak or a similar pandemic could also cause disruption to Digital Asset Markets, including the closure of Digital Asset Exchanges, which could impact the price of BTC and impact the Index or the Index Provider’s operations, all of which could have a negative impact on the Trust.
Compared sentence by sentence after normalising whitespace, quotation marks, case and digits, so re-formatting and restated figures do not read as changed language. Wording changes appear as one removal and one addition. The current filing and the prior one are authoritative.