Belpointe and Chance River today announced the launch of the Belpointe Crypto Index (index symbol: CRYPTO). This new cryptocurrency benchmark will index a diverse basket of cryptocurrencies. It will include and weight cryptocurrencies based on their market capitalization, trading volume, quality of block chain as well as additional factors.

Created by Nithin Eapen, the Belpointe Crypto Index serves to standardize measurement of the cryptocurrency markets and provides a benchmark for investment managers overseeing portfolios of cryptocurrencies.

“We’re seeing strong adoption of cryptocurrencies worldwide, fueled in part by a rising mistrust of fiat currency,” said Eapen. “People are recognizing that we can transfer value over the wire without a trusted third-party in the middle, which causes friction.

“It is absolutely impossible to pick the future winners in this space. But, we know this space is expanding, and the ability to invest in an index could be the best way to capture optimized returns.

“We see the news everyday on how an investment in Bitcoin returned 15x in 2017. The missing piece of that story is that the other coins grew from $1 billion market cap to a $300 billion market cap in 2017. There is clear opportunity to educate the wider audience of portfolio managers, financial advisors and investing public about the crypto space.”