CMC News

Bitcoin Sell-Off Pushes IBIT Investor Returns Into the Red

Aggregate dollar-weighted returns for investors in BlackRock's iShares #Bitcoin Trust have turned negative, according to Bob Elliott, chief investment officer at asset manager Unlimited Funds. Elliott posted a chart on X tracking cumulative performance, which showed returns dipping below zero as of late January after $BTC slid into the mid-$70,000 range.

The negative figure does not mean every #IBIT holder is underwater. Investors who bought in early at lower prices likely still hold a gain. The problem is that the fund attracted enormous inflows at much higher price levels later in the year, and those purchases have pulled the overall dollar-weighted average into the red. On a per-dollar-invested basis, cumulative gains since the fund's launch have now been erased, Elliott's data showed.

IBIT's dollar-weighted returns peaked at roughly $35 billion in October, when $BTC was trading near record highs. The fund remains one of BlackRock's most successful launches, having become the fastest #ETF in history to reach $70 billion in assets under management. In October, it generated approximately $25 million more in fees than #BlackRock's second-most profitable ETF, according to reports at the time.

Yahoo Finance data confirms that IBIT's net asset value has been declining for several weeks, tracking closely with the broader $BTC sell-off. That erosion in underlying value is what has pushed aggregate investor returns into negative territory.

Outflows from $BTC investment products have been accelerating alongside the price decline. In the week ending Jan. 25, $BTC funds alone lost nearly $1.1 billion, while total crypto fund outflows reached $1.73 billion, the largest weekly #withdrawal since mid-November, according to CoinShares. The majority of that capital left U.S.-based products.