Bitwise bitcoin ETF draws most inflows on first trading day

NEW YORK: Crypto asset manager Bitwise said on Friday that $240 million flowed into its spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), the most of the 10 such products that began trading on Thursday.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission approved 11 spot bitcoin ETFs this week, including BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, and ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF, among others, after a decade-long tussle with the digital asset industry.
On the first day of trading, $4.6 billion worth of shares changed hands across all the products, according to LSEG data from Thursday which tracks total trading activity, including inflows and outflows. Reuters could not immediately verify Bitwise’s data.
Grayscale, BlackRock and Fidelity dominated total trading on Thursday, the LSEG data showed.
The products mark a watershed moment for the cryptocurrency industry that is set to test whether digital assets – still viewed by many professionals as risky – can gain broader acceptance as an investment. The market is closely watching inflows during their first few days of trading.
“We think that this will become a market measured in the tens of billions of dollars,” said Matt Hougan, chief investment officer at Bitwise.
The ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF, the first bitcoin futures ETF approved by the SEC in 2021, accumulated $1 billion in assets within its first days of trading.