Bitcoin ETF volumes soar again, with BlackRock still on top

The iShares Bitcoin Trust shattered its daily trade volume record hours before market close Wednesday

February 28, 2024 01:15 pm

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The spot bitcoin ETF by asset management giant BlackRock is a hot trade this week.

So are some of its main competitors, as a handful of the segment’s funds have seen trading volumes spike amid a BTC price rally.

BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) had notched volumes worth $2.2 billion on Wednesday, as of 1 pm ET, according to Yahoo Finance data — already shattering its previous daily high with three hours left in the trading day.

IBIT’s prior record of about $1.3 billion came on Tuesday, barely surpassing the previous all-time high set on Monday.

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Fidelity Investments’ Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) had done about $860 million in trade volumes by 1 pm ET on Wednesday.

The trading volume count for the Ark 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB) and the Bitwise Bitcoin ETF (BITB) were roughly $280 million and $180 million, respectively, at that time.

Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Eric Balchunas noted in a midday X post that the nine US spot bitcoin ETFs — excluding the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC) — had already broken their combined trading volumes high for a single day.

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“This is officially a craze,” Balchunas added.

Unlike its competing offerings, GBTC operated as a trust on the OTC markets for about a decade before converting to an ETF on Jan. 11. Its trading volumes stood at more than $1.2 billion at 1 pm ET.

The Grayscale fund led all spot bitcoin ETFs in daily trading volumes for several weeks until IBIT became the first to edge the product in that category on Feb. 1.

The recent trading volumes have equated to heavy net inflows for BlackRock’s IBIT, which enjoyed a record $520 million of net inflows on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the higher-priced GBTC has endured daily outflows each day over the last seven weeks, bleeding $126 million yesterday.

The high ETF trade volumes have come as bitcoin has rallied in recent days. BTC’s price jumped above $63,000 Wednesday afternoon before retreating to about $61,000 — a 20% increase from seven days ago.

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