BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust, IBIT spot Bitcoin exchange traded fund (ETF), just had record high outflows Jan. 2.
Farside Investors data shows that on Jan. 2 IBIT saw $333 million worth of outflows—the highest ever reported for the Bitcoin ETF. Alex Obchakevich, founder of Obchakevich Research, told Decrypt You can also find out more about us here. “the main reason for the outflow is profit-taking by investors in early 2025.”
“At the end of the year, investors and funds often review their investment portfolios, which can lead to the sale of some shares,” He clarified.
Overall, BTC ETFs based in the U.S. lost $248 Million on January 2, 2019. IBIT was the top loser, followed by the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) with its $23 million in withdrawals—the only other product to report a negative capital net flow.
Isaac Joshua—the CEO of token launch platform Gems—also told Decrypt The recent economic downturn was announced yesterday “can largely be attributed to end-of-year tax-loss harvesting by investors,” He gave an explanation. According to him “many have liquidated both Bitcoin ETFs and the underlying asset itself to optimize their tax reports, a common phenomenon in financial markets during this period.”
Despite this, BlackRock’s Bitcoin-ETF remains a popular choice among investors. Ryan Lee—chief analyst at the research subsidiary of crypto exchange Bitget—recently highlighted in a note that “BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF is poised to accelerate Bitcoin’s adoption by simplifying access for institutional investors, enhancing its legitimacy and facilitating mainstream acceptance.”
IBIT surpassed $50 billion in assets under management just 228 days after its launch—more than five times faster than any other ETF in history. “By bridging traditional finance with cryptocurrency, the ETF is expected to stabilize BTC's market perception and potentially reduce price volatility,” Joshua said.
CoinMarketCap shows that Bitcoin was trading just below $96,700 at the time of publication. It had gained 0.11% in the past 24 hours, and 0.35% during the previous seven days. Current price is 10.7% less than December 17’s all-time record high, which was nearly $108,300.
Stacy Elliott is the editor.