Bitcoin (BTC) price today reached a new high, climbing up to $51,828, with altcoins also experiencing increased activity. The motivation for this surge is once again Spot Bitcoin ETFs. We have been discussing how these investment tools are expected to drive market sentiment to a peak in 2024. Now, as new records are being set, the BTC price continues to rise.
Bitcoin News
While GBTC holds the top spot in terms of reserve size, BlackRock, starting from scratch, has now exceeded 100,000 BTC in assets under management. iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) leads in net inflows, with a significant portion of GBTC outflows and new inflows going to BlackRock and Fidelity ETFs.
According to official data from BlackRock, IBIT held 105,280 BTC as of February 13th. BlackRock became the first company to surpass 100,000 BTC in assets under management within just 22 trading days. Before the fund began trading on January 11, it held a starting balance of 2,621 BTC, reaching the previous day’s closing level with an increase of over 3700%.
Fidelity is not far behind with its Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) ETF holding 83,925 BTC. Fidelity, owning the third-largest Bitcoin ETF and having been involved with cryptocurrencies for years, was still overshadowed by the prominence of BlackRock’s name.
Grayscale had started its launch with 619,220 BTC. As a trust, GBTC traded with negative/positive premium and has been trading at a negative premium since 2021, which allowed investors at a loss to make significant gains once the price reached a neutral level. Subsequently, investors who profited from the elimination of the negative premium switched to other ETFs or converted to cash to avoid the annual 1.5% transaction fee. Now, having reduced its assets by 25%, Grayscale holds 463,475 BTC.
Never Enough Records
Spot Bitcoin ETFs are showing outstanding performance, significantly pushing up the spot price. Since the launch of IBIT, we have seen a new record in terms of daily net inflows. While the total daily net inflows for all ETFs were $631 million, the iShares Bitcoin ETF alone saw an inflow of $493 million. Various experts have made comments on social media about this situation.
“BlackRock ran out of coins from OTC sellers. BlackRock literally had to buy BTC from Coinbase,” one comment read.
