ETF Spotlight: FBTC Flows Soar as Bitcoin ETFs Roar

The Fidelity Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) generated nearly $680 million in daily inflows over a two-day period earlier this week, spearheading the latest spike in a month-long upturn for the fledgling spot bitcoin exchange traded funds. 

FBTC has reached more than $9.5 billion in net flows to rank a solid second behind BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) among the 11 products that began trading this year. This week it eclipsed IBIT, which generated a still respectable $430 million in net flows. 

"Fidelity not messing around," Bloomberg Senior ETF Analyst Eric Balchunas tweeted on Wednesday after the previous day's $379 million upswing. 

The recent jump in flows has come as demand for digital asset-focused investments resumes, a result of growing investor comfort with the assets and perception that regulators have become more receptive to them. Bitcoin was recently trading over $71,000, roughly flat over the past 24 hours and down from its all-time high above $73,000 in March, but the asset is up more than 2.5% for the week and 61% year-to-date.

Spot bitcoin ETFs are based on the ongoing price of bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization. 

FBTC has generated more than $1 billion in flows over the past month behind only IBIT. Those two funds have accounted for an approximately $3.8 billion upswing in flows over this period. Flows into the products rested at the end of March and into April following a torrid beginning in which IBIT became the fastest fund in ETF history to pass $10 billion in inflows. 

In an email to etf.com, Bloomberg ETF Analyst James Seyffart attributed the increased ETF flows to a change in the political climate in which crypto-shy Democrats have joined Republicans to show support for digital assets.

"I think the flows we are seeing now into bitcoin ETFs are partly a culmination of this shift," Seyffart said, adding: "We are also about 5 months into the spot bitcoin ETFs' existence, it's possible different wealth platforms, advisors, and institutions are allowing more investment into the ETFs."

Issuers won long-sought approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission on Jan. 10 to begin trading, overcoming the agency's concerns about fraud and market manipulation.