Spot Bitcoin ETFs are taking a beating, shedding another $648.64 million on Monday following last week’s $1 billion outflows, according to SoSoValue.
BlackRock’s IBIT led Monday’s outflows with $448 million
It was followed by ARK Invest and 21Shares’ $110 million and Fidelity’s $63 million outflows. Bitcoin dropped 6.7% from $81,700 last Thursday to a weekly low of $76,201, according to CoinGecko data. It is down 0.7% over the past 24 hours and is currently trading at around $76,680.
Agne Linge, Advisor to the Board at blockchain financial infrastructure firm Wefi, told Decrypt that the outflows are “correlated to the general market and reflect the de-risking strategy that was conducted by fund managers in light of geopolitical events,” amid the recent escalation in the U.S.-Iran conflict. While Linge alluded to the impact of the geopolitical situation, Illia Otychenko, lead analyst at CEX.IO, suggested the outflows were “driven by last week’s U.S. inflation data, which significantly shifted market expectations around Federal Reserve policy, with rising expectations of a rate hike this year.” On Myriad, a prediction market owned by Decrypt’s parent company Dastan, users place just a 2% chance on the Fed decreasing rates by 25 bps in June, and a 4% chance of them cutting rates by more than 25 bps before July. Otychenko also noted that the broader de-risking sentiment was also driven by “rising concerns that the U.S.-Iran conflict could escalate again, with Donald Trump’s ‘calm before the storm’ post.” Reflecting last week’s 6.7% drop in Bitcoin and the weekly ETF outflows, investor sentiment on the Crypto Fear and Greed Index has dropped to 25, indicating “Extreme Fear.” Looking ahead Despite the bearish sentiment, several structural factors could cushion further downside.