Bitcoin investment vehicles I've heard of at least 2 financial products which enable people to take positions on bitcoin in the stock market. Here's a Reuter's article on one. Can anyone explain what the purpose of these investment vehicles is? Why would someone want to pay a financial institution ~2%/year to hold their bitcoin for them? Not to mention the counterparty risk...


  "By listing the ETI on the Gibraltar Stock Exchange, which is an EU-regulated market, we are able to bring a high level of transparency and liquidity to investors", said Revoltura CEO Ransu Salovaara.


Transparency? How is an opaque financial product - which may or may not be backed by actual bitcoin - going to provide more transparency than trades on a public blockchain?

Is this simply a money grab to exploit the people who don't have a clue or am I missing something?
Regarding audience: ETIs are regulated. Not just regulated, but they are marketed for sophisticated investors. In fact regulation prevents marketing these for general audience, so there shouldn't be issues having investors who do not know what they are doing. Investors in this case are banks and pension fund like actor, though I am not sure what's the definition of the sophisticated investor in EU.
Regarding cost: There is a premium cost bringing a new investment vehicle to market. Mainly, because to have something regulated it should be insured. Bitcoin is very new. Financial market operators are not familiar with all risk models yet. Thus, insurance carries a high premium. BitcoinETI is audited by PriceWaterhouseCoopers and needs to pay various fees to stock markets, exchanges and such. For comparison, Digital Currency Group's Grayscale Bitcoin trust carries 2% maintenance fee.  
Regarding transparency: BitcoinETI prospectus is public, vetted by regulators and all fees are clear up front. The ETI must publish it Net Asset Value (NAV) continuously. Public blockchain doesn't include fiat nominated (USD, EUR) transactions of traded Bitcoins. These are internal to Bitcoin exchanges. Some exchanges choose to publish this data independently. Even if it's published, it is suspected that many Chinese exchanges manipulate this data. As virtual currency exchanges companies are not regulated, this practice cannot be confirmed or stopped.