Spot bitcoin ETFs see $195 million exit, largest daily outflow in 2 weeks

U.S. spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds saw $194.6 million in net outflows on Thursday, marking the largest negative flow in two weeks.

BlackRock's IBIT led the outflows with $112.9 million, followed by Fidelity's FBTC with $54.2 million, according to SoSoValue data. VanEck's HODL, Grayscale's GBTC, Bitwise's BITB also logged outflows.

Thursday's move followed Wednesday's $14.9 million net outflow, and marked the largest single-day outflow since Nov. 20.

The ETFs' trading volume fell to $3.1 billion on Thursday, compared to $4.2 billion on Wednesday and $5.3 billion on Tuesday.

Bitcoin edged down 1.4% over the past 24 hours at $91,989 as of 2:30 a.m. ET Friday, according to The Block's price page. The world’s largest cryptocurrency briefly fell to around $84,000 earlier this week but has since recovered.

Nick Ruck, director of LVRG Research, told The Block that the outflows appear to be driven primarily by ongoing unwinds of basis trades as the futures-spot spread compressed below breakeven levels, "forcing arbitrageurs to sell holdings amid heightened market volatility." 

"Traders are closely monitoring upcoming U.S. inflation data reports and the Federal Reserve's December 10 rate decision, with expectations of a 25-basis-point cut potentially stabilizing sentiment if it signals further easing," Ruck said.

Timothy Misir, BRN's head of research, said yesterday that exchange balances have fallen to roughly 1.8 million BTC, the lowest level since 2017, based on aggregated CryptoQuant and Glassnode data. 

"The market opened with quiet strength," Misir said. "Accumulation is persistent, supply is thinning on exchanges, and price is stabilizing above the True Market Mean. What’s missing is a clean break into the $96K–$106K band."

Meanwhile, spot Ethereum ETFs posted $41.6 million in net outflows on Thursday, compared to inflows of $140.2 million the day before. Among the ETFs, Grayscale's ETHE saw the largest net outflows with $30.9 million.

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