Merrill Edge Bitcoin and Crypto ETF in 2026

Item: Merrill Edge Crypto
Rating: 2
Author: Chad Morris

Trading Bitcoin at Merrill Edge

Key takeaways:

• Direct trading in Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies is not available at Merrill Edge.

• Merrill Edge does offer Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs.

• Merrill clients who want direct crypto trading should consider Robinhood as an alternative.

Do you want to invest in cryptocurrencies? If so, you need the right broker. Merrill Edge performs well in some areas and comes up short in others. Here’s the full story:

Cryptocurrencies at Merrill Edge

Merrill Edge does not offer trading in cryptocurrencies themselves. That is the first drawback we run into with Merrill. It does, however, offer trading in exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and some of these securities hold cryptocurrencies. As a result, they provide an indirect way to invest in digital currencies.

Finding Crypto ETFs at Merrill Edge

It’s very easy to find funds at Merrill Edge that invest in Bitcoin and Ethereum. Just click on the Research tab in the main menu and choose the link for ETFs under the section for Investments & Screeners.

On the ETFs hub, look for the second row of tabs beneath the main row; there, you will see a tab for ETF Screener. Click on it.

Once the search wizard opens, you will want to specify Digital Assets as the Morningstar category. When we did that, we received 74 results. Some of these funds hold futures contracts on Bitcoin and Ethereum, while others hold Bitcoin and Ethereum directly. Some of the ETFs are also leveraged products. Be sure to read a fund’s prospectus carefully before making an investment.

Merrill Edge Bitcoin ETFs

Researching Crypto ETFs at Merrill Edge

To pull up information on a specific fund, look for the drop-down arrow next to the ticker symbol in the search results. You’ll get a small window with five choices:

- Add to watchlist
- Compare tool
- Set alert
- View prospectus
- Trade

To access the fund’s profile, simply click on the hyperlinked ticker symbol. Now you’ll get a brief profile with various data points such as 52-week range, gross expense ratio, and the day’s volume. There is a link to perform more research; click on this button to get the full profile. On the complete profile, there is more information, including option chains and technical analysis from Technical Insight©.

One fund we found in Merrill’s search results was BITB. This is the Bitwise Bitcoin Trust. It has about $2.77 billion in assets and holds just one financial vehicle: Bitcoin. Because the ETF has just one asset, the fund is not diversified.

Merrill’s profile for BITB shows a beta of 1.73, which points to a high level of volatility. With average volume of about 1.7 million shares every market day, the Bitwise fund is still heavily traded. It pays no dividend for obvious reasons.

How to Buy Bitcoin ETF at Merrill Edge

Submitting an order for a Bitcoin fund follows the same basic process as any other ETF or stock trade. An order can be entered through Merrill’s website, trading platform MarketPro, or mobile app.

On the website, you can select the trade link mentioned above that appears in the drop-down window from the list of results. A blue trade button also appears on an ETF’s profile. On MarketPro, a trade link can be opened from a watchlist (right click on the entry).

All three trading platforms at Merrill Edge use the same order ticket. Trailing, market, stop, and limit orders are accepted; shorting is also allowed.

Merrill Bitcoin Trading

Fees and Minimums

Merrill Edge charges no commissions on trades of crypto ETFs (or any other ETFs). There is no account minimum for a brokerage account, although an IRA, which can be used to trade Bitcoin ETFs, does have a $49.95 closeout fee.

Robinhood as an Alternative

The Bitwise Bitcoin ETF we looked at above has an expense ratio of 0.20%; this amount comes out of the fund every year. If this management fee is too much for you, you could skip the fund universe and . Although this strategy is not available at Merrill Edge, it is available at Robinhood.

Robinhood offers direct crypto trading in 71 currencies. Besides the majors like Bitcoin and Ethereum, there are some exotics:

Aave (AAVE)
Aerodrome Finance (AERO)
Arbitrum (ARB)
Aster (ASTER)
Avalanche (AVAX)
Avantis (AVNT)
Bitcoin (BTC)
Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
BNB (BNB)
BONK (BONK)
Canton Coin (CC)
Cardano (ADA)
cat in a dogs world (MEW)
Chainlink (LINK)
Compound (COMP)
Curve DAO (CRV)
Dogecoin (DOGE)
Dogwifhat (WIF)
EigenCloud (EIGEN)
Ethena (ENA)
Ethereum (ETH)
Ethereum Classic (ETC)
Floki (FLOKI)
Global Dollar (USDG)
Hedera (HBAR)
Hyperliquid (HYPE)
Immutable (IMX)
LayerZero (ZRO)
Lido DAO (LDO)
Lighter (LIT)
Litecoin (LTC)
Mantle (MNT)
Maple Finance (SYRUP)
MegaETH (MEGA)
Moo Deng (MOODENG)
NEAR Protocol (NEAR)
OFFICIAL TRUMP (TRUMP)
Ondo (ONDO)
Onyxcoin (XCN)
Optimism (OP)
Orca (ORCA)
Pax Gold (PAXG)
Peanut the Squirrel (PNUT)
Pepecoin (PEPE)
Plasma (XPL)
Polkadot (DOT)
Popcat (POPCAT)
Pudgy Penguins (PENGU)
Pyth Network (PYTH)
Quant (QNT)
Raydium (RAY)
Render (RENDER)
Seeker (SKR)
SEI (SEI)
Shiba Inu (SHIB)
Sky (SKY)
Solana (SOL)
SUI (SUI)
Stellar Lumens (XLM)
Synthetix (SNX)
Tezos (XTZ)
The Graph (GRT)
Toncoin (TON)
Uniswap (UNI)
USD Coin (USDC)
USD.AI (CHIP)
Virtuals Protocol (VIRTUAL)
World Liberty Financial (WLFI)
Wormhole (W)
XRP (XRP)
Zcash (ZEC)
Zora (ZORA)

To find the list of available digital coins at Robinhood, simply type “Tradable Crypto” in the search field on the website or mobile app. You’ll get the list of coins; just click or tap on an entry to pull up the asset’s profile. To enter a trade, tap on the Trade button at the bottom of the app; on the website, the order ticket is already installed. Available choices for cryptocurrencies include market, limit, and recurring.

Can I buy crypto on Merrill Edge

Robinhood , although pricing now depends on the routing method used. Market maker routing has no commissions, while smart exchange routing uses a tiered fee schedule that starts at 0.85% for up to $50,000 of trailing 30-day crypto volume. Keep in mind that ETFs also have spreads that increase the cost of trading them.

Robinhood Crypto Account

Visit Robinhood Website

Merrill Lynch Crypto Summary

Merrill Edge offers indirect crypto investing, while Robinhood offers both indirect and direct access.

Updated on 4/8/2026.

About the Author

Chad Morris is a financial writer with more than 20 years experience as both an English teacher and an avid trader. When he isn’t writing expert content for Brokerage-Review.com, Chad can usually be found managing his portfolio or building a new home computer.