Highlights
① Bitcoin spot ETF's 2024 report card: AUM totaled $115 billion, currently holding 5.7% of the Bitcoin supply. But it still only accounts for about 1% of the total AUM of all ETFs worldwide, which shows that crypto assets still have huge growth potential in the future.
② BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF is dominant, and Grayscale's once important position has declined as investors turn to low-cost options. Overall, Bitcoin spot ETFs have promoted institutional adoption, redefined market structure and consolidated Bitcoin's position as a mainstream asset.
③ Trump promised to make the United States a "crypto capital" and appointed Sachs as the cryptocurrency czar. With the advancement of the FIT 21 bill, the proposal of the Bitcoin reserve plan, and the shift in regulatory attitudes, the crypto industry will usher in a policy warm spring in 2025.
2024 is an exciting year in crypto history. Bitcoin prices hit record highs, blockchain infrastructure has improved significantly, stablecoins have found product-market fit, and Bitcoin and Ethereum spot ETFs have been approved. At the same time, the US legislative and regulatory environment is opening a positive path forward for the industry. All of this has laid the groundwork for a continued outbreak in 2025.
For the US stock market, the launch of Bitcoin spot ETFs is obviously of great significance. They have expanded retail and institutional investors' investment channels for Bitcoin, attracted tens of billions of dollars in net capital inflows, and elevated this asset class from a niche asset to a mainstream asset. This may be the most successful ETF in financial history, with assets under management (AUM) exceeding $110 billion in just one year.
In this article, the RockFlow investment research team will take you to review the remarkable success of Bitcoin spot ETFs on their first anniversary, review their leading issuers and their profound impact on Bitcoin and financial markets, and most importantly, why we believe that the crypto market will usher in a brand new situation in the Trump 2.0 era.
1. One year after the launch of Bitcoin spot ETFs, the crypto market has changed dramatically
After a decade of anticipation, repeated rejections of applications, and false news that caught the crypto market off guard, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) finally approved the launch of a Bitcoin spot ETF on January 10, 2024.
Soon thereafter, 11 ETFs entered the market one after another, competing to attract capital inflows. Issuers include asset managers with tens of trillions of dollars in assets under management, such as BlackRock, Fidelity and other traditional financial giants, as well as crypto-native institutions such as Bitwise.

Bitcoin spot ETFs have attracted a lot of funds since their launch. The acceleration of capital inflows coincides with a period of high market sentiment, which has brought fresh blood to all areas of the crypto ecosystem. Although there was a downturn in the summer of 2024, Trump's victory in the US presidential election in November once again boosted optimism, and ETF inflows were strengthened again.
So far, the net inflow of Bitcoin spot ETFs is about $32 billion, holding more than 1.1 million bitcoins, equivalent to a total asset size of $115 billion. These holdings currently account for about 5.7% of the circulating supply of Bitcoin.
But on the other hand, Bitcoin spot ETFs only account for about 1% of the total assets under management of all ETFs worldwide, which shows that crypto assets still have great growth potential in the future.
Who is behind such abundant funds? In fact, Bitcoin spot ETFs are mainly aimed at three major groups-individual investors, wealth advisors and institutional investors. The 13F filing discloses the buyers behind Bitcoin spot ETFs, including both retail and professional investors, as well as hedge funds and financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs and Millennium Management. This reflects the growing interest of the financial market in including Bitcoin in investment portfolios, and Bitcoin spot ETFs perfectly serve as a bridge between traditional finance and the crypto world.
RockFlow's investment research team expects capital inflows to continue to accelerate in 2025. As regulatory conditions are relaxed, we will also see wider participation from pension funds, family offices, and endowment funds. From an optimistic point of view, the AUM of Bitcoin spot ETFs may double.
2. ETF issuers and how it affects Bitcoin itself
Once upon a time, Grayscale's GBTC was the main tool for indirect investment in Bitcoin, but after the mass launch of Bitcoin spot ETFs, GBTC gradually faced challenges due to high management fees. Most new investors (and even existing investors) turned to the newly launched Bitcoin spot ETFs because their fees are generally around 0.2% (many even had 0 fees at the beginning), which is much lower than Grayscale GBTC's 1.5%.
In addition, GBTC is also seeking change and has taken the initiative to split off another Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust (BTC) with a lower fee rate as a low-cost alternative to GBTC.
From the perspective of the issuer, BlackRock and Fidelity are clearly the biggest winners. Taking BlackRock as an example, its Bitcoin spot ETF, IBIT, currently holds about 540,000 Bitcoins, accounting for half of the total Bitcoin held by all ETFs. At the same time, Grayscale's GBTC's Bitcoin holdings have dropped sharply from 600,000 to 200,000, becoming the biggest loser.
On the other hand, BlackRock's IBIT asset management scale has reached nearly $60 billion, far exceeding the scale of BlackRock's largest gold ETF, IAU ($35 billion), further consolidating Bitcoin's position as "digital gold." According to Bloomberg ETF analysts, IBIT reached the milestone of $50 billion in assets under management in just 227 trading days, breaking the previous record of 1,323 days set by the iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (IEMG).
Investors choose real money to support Bitcoin spot ETFs due to their interest in Bitcoin. At the same time, Bitcoin spot ETFs are also affecting the price and market structure of Bitcoin itself. According to Coin Metrics statistics, as a stable source of demand for Bitcoin, the net inflow of funds of Bitcoin spot ETFs has a very significant impact on the price of Bitcoin.
The figure below shows that large inflows or outflows of funds in Bitcoin spot ETFs almost always occur at the same time as major price fluctuations in Bitcoin.

Especially during periods of strong market momentum or large inflows, the correlation between the two tends to increase, suggesting that as issuers buy Bitcoin to meet ETF investor demand, it has become a structural driver of Bitcoin's price rise. As Bitcoin prices continue to rise, ETF products become more attractive to retail and institutional investors, thus forming a mutually reinforcing feedback loop that attracts more inflows.
Of course, it should be noted that the two trends are not completely consistent, because in addition to spot ETFs, the broader macro environment, investor sentiment, and the market influence of institutions such as MicroStrategy also play an important role.
3. In the Trump 2.0 era, the crypto market will usher in a new situation
The RockFlow investment research team believes that the crypto market will further rise in 2025, mainly because the crypto-friendly president, Trump, has officially entered the White House. In the previous year, he had repeatedly expressed his support for the crypto economy when he ran for election. His promises at the time included but were not limited to:
firing Gary Gensler, the current chairman of the SEC who has repeatedly "embarrassed" the crypto industry,
reducing the sentence of the founder of Silk Road,
ending the US suppression and "crusade" on cryptocurrencies,
preventing the US from further developing CBDC,
making the US the world's "crypto capital",
preventing the US from selling its bitcoin holdings,
establishing a strategic bitcoin reserve,
proposing the use of cryptocurrency to solve the US debt problem,
Appoint a crypto advisory committee and promote rules "made by people who love the industry," and so on.
Trump, who has just taken office, is indeed steadily advancing his commitment to the crypto industry at the time. Therefore, in 2025, the Trump administration and the Republican-controlled Congress may bring major changes to the crypto field-a welcome change for industry participants.
In addition, in this round of US elections, the crypto industry began to "show its face" and became one of the important financiers of the election: According to relevant reports, the cryptocurrency-supporting super political action committee (PAC) Fairshake raised more than $200 million from the crypto industry to help candidates who support cryptocurrencies win. It mainly targets Republicans and key Democratic candidates, and this move is expected to continue to bring much-needed regulatory clarity to the crypto industry.
It is worth mentioning that as early as December 2024, Trump appointed former PayPal executive Sachs as the "AI and Crypto Tsar" of the White House. Sachs is seen as a supporter of innovation and the crypto industry, and some crypto practitioners believe that the "crypto czar" is expected to bring more benefits in supporting digital assets.
In addition, during the last Congress, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the 21st Century Financial Innovation and Technology Act (FIT 21), which aims to establish a regulatory framework for digital assets and divide jurisdiction between the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Although FIT 21 does not meet all the requirements of the crypto industry, it represents the biggest effort made by the U.S. Congress to date.
Also, there is a renewed interest in establishing a strategic reserve of Bitcoin. Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming recently launched the Bitcoin Act, which hopes to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve for the United States and develop a structured Bitcoin purchase plan.
In addition to the above, the RockFlow investment research team expects that the U.S. federal bank and other financial regulators will review the crypto policy in the Biden era. Since 2021, regulators have put pressure on banks to "cancel" controversial crypto businesses by issuing multiple related interpretations, essentially preventing banks from engaging in custody and other activities. Given that Trump has pledged to protect the crypto industry from regulatory "persecution", the revocation of these interpretations represents a major shift in regulation.
Finally, increased capital market activity in the crypto industry is also an important positive. With increased regulatory transparency, coupled with continued investor attention, increased institutional adoption, and increased venture capital, related capital market activities (including IPOs) are expected to increase significantly. As the crypto economy continues to mature, the convergence of regulatory developments and market enthusiasm will create more opportunities for public listings, M&A transactions, and deeper institutional involvement.
Conclusion
The RockFlow investment research team believes that financial products represented by Bitcoin spot ETFs are reshaping the crypto investment landscape. They not only effectively attract capital inflows from institutions and retail investors, but also drive structural demand for Bitcoin. Over the past year, they have demonstrated their potential to legitimize and expand the use cases of crypto assets.
Meanwhile, Ethereum ETFs, although slow to start, are gaining momentum and are seeing growing demand from investors. As the market matures further, new opportunities could further increase the appeal of the crypto market to traditional financial investors. The next wave of ETF inflows could unleash even greater growth.
In 2025, with the interweaving of favorable factors such as rising expectations for crypto-friendly policies, a clearer regulatory environment, continued entry of institutional investors, and strategic reserve plans, the crypto market will usher in a new round of growth cycle.