BlackRock’s Bitcoin ETF flips gold fund
2024-11-09

BlackRock’s Bitcoin BTCUSD exchange-traded fund (ETF) now holds more assets than the asset manager’s gold ETF despite only launching in January, data from BlackRock shows.
IShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) exceeds $33 billion in net assets as of Nov. 8, surpassing iShares Gold Trust (IAU), which holds just shy of that amount, according to iShares.
It’s an “absolutely wild” feat because IBIT launched only 10 months ago, whereas IAU has been trading since 2005, Nate Geraci, president of The ETF Store, said in a Nov. 8 post on the X platform.
Related: BTC investors pour $1.1B into BlackRock ETF as Bitcoin marks another high
The crypto market surged following Donald Trump’s victory in the United States presidential election, as many believe his win will benefit the industry, Cointelegraph Research said.
Nov. 6 was IBIT’s “biggest volume day ever” as investors flocked to cryptocurrencies after Trump’s election win, Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas said in a Nov. 6 X post.
On Nov. 7, IBIT clocked $1.1 billion in inflows, reclaiming inflow status after two consecutive days of outflows totaling $113.3 million, according to Farside data.
Meanwhile, Bitcoin continued the trend of consecutive daily all-time highs as BTC’s price traded above $76,800.
Bitcoin has dominated the ETF landscape this year, accounting for six of the top 10 most successful launches in 2024, Geraci said in an X post.
Of the approximately 400 new ETFs launched in 2024, the four biggest launches by inflows have all been spot BTC ETFs, Geraci said in September.
Trump’s presidential win is a greenlight for more than half a dozen proposed crypto ETFs waiting on regulatory approval to list in the US. 
In 2024, asset managers submitted a flurry of regulatory filings to list ETFs holding altcoins, including Solana (SOL), XRP (XRP) and Litecoin (LTC), among others.
Issuers are also waiting on approval for several planned crypto index ETFs designed to hold diverse baskets of tokens.
The filings were effectively “call options on a Trump victory” in the US presidential race, Balchunas said on Oct. 25.