With Bitcoin 2024<\/a> fast approaching \u2013 July 25-27 in Nashville, TN \u2013 three enterprising fund managers are competing to win $1 million in seed capital in the Bitcoin Alpha Competition<\/a> powered by Samara Alpha Management<\/a>\u00a0in partnership with Bitcoin Magazine Pro<\/a>.<\/p>\n In a recent podcast<\/a>, Bitcoin Magazine sat down with the Bitcoin Alpha Competition judges to discuss the state of the Bitcoin market and how individual investors are leveraging their agility to front-run larger capital allocators as Bitcoin moves into the age of institutional adoption.<\/p>\n Patrick Lowry, judge of the Bitcoin Alpha Competition and CEO of Samara Asset Group<\/a>, believes that while Spot ETFs have been a resounding success, trillions of dollars of institutional capital have yet to seize the opportunity in \u201cthe best form of money humanity has ever conceived\u201d largely due to both regulatory and organizational burden. This has left smaller organizations \u2013 family offices and individual investors \u2013 to seize the opportunity.<\/p>\n Remarking upon his experience at Deutsche Digital, one of Europe\u2019s first Bitcoin ETP issuers, Lowry noted, \u201cI can attest how difficult it is to become an asset manager. It is unbelievably difficult to start and found your own asset management firm. I can\u2019t even tell you how many times I\u2019ve had my nose bloodied by an ungodly amount of regulators and compliance officers\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, one of the things I\u2019ve always wanted to do is empower new-age managers, emerging asset managers, in this asset class that I have strong belief in. [Helping] them in a way that they\u2019re not going to have to go through the same hurdles that I went through six, seven years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n Joining Lowry as judges on the judges panel are Adil Abdulali, CIO of Samara Alpha Management<\/a>, and Jack Elliot, CTO of Animus Technologies<\/a> and winner of the inaugural Bitcoin Alpha Competition.<\/p>\n Lowry, Abdulali and Elliot will serve as the judges for the second-annual Bitcoin Alpha Competition, July 25 at Bitcoin 2024, Nashville.<\/p>\n Abdulali, bringing his decades of experience in the hedge fund space, noted that Bitcoin \u2013 in comparison to traditional assets \u2013 offers a unique risk profile with its heightened volatility. This volatility, especially to the upside, reduces the need for leverage to generate returns. Abdulali believes obviating the need for leverage gives capital allocators a unique option in comparison to fixed-income arbitrage, saying:<\/p>\n \u201cAny time you have an unleveraged strategy that also generates high returns, and there is a drawdown\u2026 you don\u2019t have to liquidate. You can stay in the trade for as long as it takes\u2026 any kind of leverage strategy, no matter how safe you think it is, eventually will be susceptible to [margin being called].\u201d This ostensibly offers a new way of managing investment risk and another tool in the toolkit when searching for a return.<\/p>\n While Bitcoin has certainly benefited from improved sentiment around Donald Trump\u2019s positive comments on the asset of late, even these types of moves can present risks for fund managers. Jack Elliot, a CTO focused on optimizing his firm Animus\u2019 artificial intelligence-based strategies, noted the importance of being flexible and resilient to tail risks when it comes to modeling and trading the Bitcoin market.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s just acknowledging reality\u2026 this is a space that is extremely young and is developing extremely quickly and there are going to be a number of different factors that change the way the market behaves. And some of those are going to be step-function changes\u2026 and I think there are going to be a number of those in the future\u2026 For us, it\u2019s about staying on the horse\u2026 it\u2019s a fun problem because [modeling the market] is <\/em>intractable.\u201d<\/p>\n On July 25th, Lowry, Abdulali and Elliot will select the winner of $1 million in seed capital to enable an enterprising fund manager to scale their fund strategy, selecting from the following three finalists:<\/p>\n Boreal.xyzL1 YieldHill Valley Capital<\/p>\n The finalists for the 2024 Bitcoin Alpha Competition powered by Samara Alpha Management<\/p>\n