Owner BlackRock Inc. (NYSE: BLK) iShares Bitcoin Trust (NASDAQ: IBIT) began trading on January 11. Almost forty days after its inception, the ETF’s holdings of Bitcoin (BTC) have already exceeded those of MicroStrategy (NASDAQ: MSTR).
On March 8, as is customary, HODL15Capital disclosed BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin ETF results in its weekly closing. Surprisingly, BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust had an increase of 31,588 BTC this week, making it the third-best week for IBIT.
When looking at the nine weeks of activity for Bitcoin ETFs, the financial product from BlackRock comes out on top with 196,088 BTC added to its holdings.
This latest action elevates the iShares Bitcoin Trust to the top of Bitcoin’s wealthy list, surpassing MicroStrategy. After buying 3,000 BTC on February 26, the latter now possesses 193,000 BTC.
Statistics compiled by Bitcoin Treasuries show that MicroStrategy paid an average of $31,554 for its 193,000 BTC. Interestingly, at the all-time high of Bitcoin, Michael Saylor’s business lost $6.09 billion on these transactions.
Investors were considering MSTR as a means to indirectly get stock market exposure to Bitcoin prior to the ETFs’ approval. Consequently, conventional finance becomes more competitive in navigating the price movement of the top cryptocurrency with the formalization of BTC exchange-traded funds.
Furthermore, IBIT reached a high of $40.20 on March 8 and ended the week at $39.55. This amounts to a gain of 41.55% in the 39 trading days after its inception, mirroring the performance of Bitcoin.
During that time, the trust’s daily chart shows that IBIT’s volume on NASDAQ was $1.145 billion. There are significant costs and benefits to purchasing and keeping Bitcoin versus getting exposure to spot Bitcoin ETFs. One such example is the 0.25% fee that owners of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust are required to pay. Coinbase (NASDAQ: COIN) has the asset locked up, leaving it vulnerable to systemic dangers that have been occurring recently.
Users that have faith in service providers like BlackRock or Coinbase may still bet on the future of Bitcoin by purchasing IBIT or one of the ten spot ETFs.
Investors should proceed with caution and bear in mind the inherent volatility and unpredictability of cryptocurrencies when allocating money in this setting.
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