- Bitcoin ETFs pulled in $2.8 billion over five days, pushing Bitcoin’s price from $85K to $94K, with IBIT alone snagging $1.3 billion of that.
- Michael Saylor predicts IBIT will become the world’s biggest ETF within 10 years, though experts say it would take extraordinary daily inflows to catch giants like VOO.
- Bitcoin liquidity is thinning, and the basis trade has surged to nearly 10%, hinting at more wild price swings ahead as market volatility picks up.
The past week’s been big for Bitcoin — like, really big. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs raked in a wild $2.8 billion in net inflows over just five trading days. That massive pile of money helped push Bitcoin’s price from about $85,000 to nearly $94,000.
Leading the charge? iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT). It scooped up $1.3 billion of the total inflows, making it the biggest driver of Bitcoin’s latest rally. At the moment, IBIT has a market cap of around $54 billion, and saw $1.5 billion worth of trading volume on Thursday alone — pretty intense when you compare it to giant ETFs like Vanguard’s VOO, sitting at $593.5 billion.
Michael Saylor’s Bold Prediction: IBIT Will Be #1
At the Bitcoin Standard Corporation’s Investor Day, Michael Saylor — yeah, the Strategy (MSTR) guy — dropped a pretty spicy prediction:
“IBIT will be the biggest ETF in the world in ten years.”
Now, is that realistic? Maybe. Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst over at Bloomberg, says it’s possible — but IBIT would need to start pulling in $3 to $4 billion every single day to catch VOO. Not exactly easy, but in crypto land… stranger things have definitely happened.
Saylor’s confidence seems tied to the sheer momentum Bitcoin’s gathering, especially with more companies parking BTC on their balance sheets and traditional finance starting to wake up to crypto’s staying power.
Bitcoin’s Liquidity Thins Out as Basis Trades Rise
While ETF inflows are booming, another story’s unfolding behind the scenes. Bitcoin’s liquidity has been draining fast. According to analysts, a lot of BTC has been pulled off exchanges and into long-term wallets since November 2024 — making the market thinner, and way easier to swing up or down.
Meanwhile, the annualized Bitcoin ETF basis trade — where investors go long ETFs and short futures — has shot up to almost 10%, nearly doubling from earlier this month. Futures open interest has also climbed by 2,000 BTC in just the last week.
All this points to one thing: the market’s heating up fast… and when liquidity’s thin, those sharp 10% swings in Bitcoin’s price could keep being the new normal for a while.
