Bitcoin Slips To $79,500 As $277 Million Exits Spot ETFs

Bitcoin has seen a pullback to levels below $80,000 as netflow data related to the US spot ETFs shows the exit of a notable amount of capital.

Bitcoin Spot ETF Netflow Has Broken Its 5-Day Green Streak

According to data from SoSoValue, the Bitcoin spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have just registered a red day. The spot ETFs refer to investment vehicles that allow investors to gain indirect exposure to the cryptocurrency. Whenever a trader invests into one of these products, the fund buys and custodies the digital asset on their behalf. This makes it so that the holder still gains exposure to the cryptocurrency’s price movements without having to interact with any blockchain element at all.

In the United States, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved the spot ETFs back in January 2024. Since the spot ETFs allow for indirect investment, they have gained popularity among the more traditional traders like institutional entities, who can be cautious about digital asset infrastructure like wallets and exchanges. This traction has made the spot ETFs one of the cornerstones of the sector despite being active for only 2+ years.

Below is a chart that shows how the netflow of the US Bitcoin spot ETFs has changed over the last few months.

As displayed in the graph, the Bitcoin spot ETFs have mostly seen net inflows recently, a behavior convergent with the wider trend of recovery in the digital asset sector. April only witnessed net outflows on seven days, with the scale of withdrawals involved being notably lower than the average inflows for the month.

The month ended with a three-day net outflow spree, but the start of May came with a return of bullish momentum as these funds went on a 5-day green streak. Alongside this spike in interest from institutional traders, BTC observed a rally toward the $83,000 level.

In the past day, however, market winds have changed once more. From the chart, it’s visible that spot ETFs have broken their positive netflow run with a notable red spike. In total, $277 million exited across the funds with these outflows. The Bitcoin price has retraced back below $80,000 alongside the development.

While the outflows aren’t negligible in size, they have still not been enough to overturn the net inflows that the spot ETFs have enjoyed recently; this week’s netflow still stands at a positive $768 million.

The US Ethereum spot ETFs also saw a red spike on Thursday, with over $103 million in capital exiting the funds.

Unlike for Bitcoin, though, the outflows have been strong enough to neutralize the recent inflows for Ethereum as the weekly netflow has dropped to a value of just $66 million.

BTC Price

At the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading around $79,800, up 3.5% over the past week.