In a notable development within the cryptocurrency space, the newly launched spot bitcoin ETFs, excluding Grayscale’s GBTC, have now accumulated a larger bitcoin holding compared to MicroStrategy, a prominent institutional investor in the digital asset.
The ETFs, which have only been available for less than a month, have quickly amassed over 192,000 BTC, surpassing MicroStrategy’s total holdings of approximately 190,000 BTC as of the end of January. This milestone underscores the significant inflows of capital into these ETFs, with investors eager to gain exposure to bitcoin without the need to directly purchase and store the cryptocurrency.
On Wednesday alone, the spot bitcoin ETFs attracted over $1 billion in inflows, according to data from Bloomberg Intelligence. Excluding Grayscale’s GBTC, which also transitioned into a spot product alongside other funds but had previously operated as a closed-end trust, these ETFs have seen substantial growth in their bitcoin holdings.
While GBTC started its spot ETF journey with around 630,000 bitcoin, recent profit-taking and a search for lower fees have resulted in a reduction to just over 470,000 bitcoin. Despite this decline, the combined holdings of the ETF issuers (excluding GBTC) and MicroStrategy still represent a relatively small percentage of the total 21 million bitcoin that can ever exist.
Markus Levin, head of operations at California tech startup XY Labs and co-founder of XYO, emphasized the evolving distribution of bitcoin holdings across various entities. He stated, “It could become an issue if too much BTC ends up becoming highly concentrated in any one country or company, but even with the likes of MicroStrategy and these ETFs, the concentration of coins held by these entities is not a risk to the Bitcoin Network.”
With asset management giants such as BlackRock, Fidelity, and VanEck among the ETF issuers, the combined holdings of these entities, along with MicroStrategy and GBTC, now represent approximately 4% of all the bitcoin that will ever be available. This distribution underscores the increasing institutional interest in bitcoin as a viable investment asset class, while also highlighting the growing role of ETFs in providing exposure to the digital currency within traditional financial markets.
