Spot Bitcoin ETF is “a Giant Mistake”

While the broad crypto industry is basking in the euphoria of the spot Bitcoin ETFs, market expert Jim Bianco thinks that the new offering is a giant mistake.

BTC ETF Is a Giant Mistake

President and Macro Strategist at Bianco Research, L.L.C. Jim Bianco has expressed his displeasure about the launch of spot Bitcoin ETFs. Amidst this criticism, he spoke highly of the prospects of Decentralized Finance (DeFi) as an alternative in the financial landscape. He also pointed out that the Bitcoin ETF product can produce higher prices for the flagship cryptocurrency Bitcoin, but not up to $1 million as predicted by Bitcoin stock-to-flow (S2F) model creator PlanB.

Bianco referred to spot BTC ETFs as an admission of failure, citing that it was a way of “sucking crypto into the current system.” For the macro strategist, achieving up to $1 million for Bitcoin price will require that the system brings forth innovation, or even come up with an alternative system. 

Ultimately, he sees the spot Bitcoin ETF as a way of giving up, plus the fact that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) may turn against the offering in the future like it did with gold. 

Spot Bitcoin ETF Flourishing

Bianco’s sentiment comes at a time when the spot Bitcoin ETF market is outperforming many other assets in the financial market. 

It recently outranked 3,400 existing ETFs with a weekly inflow of up to $2.3 billion. On Friday, spot Bitcoin ETFs saw a $323.90 million net inflow, and considering the total net inflows that the ecosystem has seen, up to 100,000 BTCs have moved into spot Bitcoin ETFs since launch.

Only BlackRock’s IBIT has recorded up to $5 billion in net inflows, far outperforming its peers. Looking at the volume of inflows registered by BlackRock and Fidelity, it is obvious that the two asset management firms are leading the Bitcoin ETF market, giving the industry a major leap comparable to the broader financial market ETFs.

Grayscale is still grappling with the volume of outflows from its GBTC. These outflows have raised several questions in the minds of crypto enthusiasts but in the last few days, the outflows from the firm’s BTC ETF have started slowing down.