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Large-scale capital outflows from U.S. crypto funds have continued for the ninth consecutive day and show no sign of stopping. Just before the start of the May 29 trading session, investment giant BlackRock transferred another large batch of assets worth 2,448 BTC valued at $180 million to Coinbase Prime, according to Arkham.
As is already clear by the end of the month, institutional players are taking profits out of ETFs because of the Fed's restrictive policy and U.S. Treasury yields at 5.20%. However, this prolonged sell-off unexpectedly exposed a tectonic change, as Bitcoin volatility fell to the level of defensive precious metals, specifically gold.
How Bitcoin vaults toward gold status for Wall Street
According to the latest data from the Bloomberg terminal, the 60-day historical volatility of the Bitcoin fund IBIT fell to 34.177%. At the same time, volatility in the gold ETF GLD rose to 27.227% amid geopolitical tensions. This makes the gap between the fluctuations of BTC and physical metals narrow to a record low of just 7%.
For Bloomberg senior ETF analyst Eric Balchunas, this exact factor determines the long-term viability of cryptocurrency, although it is completely ignored in the press, he stresses.
Citing top executives in the ETF industry, Balchunas emphasizes that large capital and financial advisers are not looking for tech-sector returns in Bitcoin, which they already get through Nasdaq exposure via QQQ, but rather gold-like results for efficient portfolio diversification.
High volatility had for years remained the main barrier to entry for conservative funds, but the current statistics show that this obstacle is disappearing. Therefore, pessimism around outflows is secondary and, on the contrary, IBIT is demonstrating high resilience, outperforming the traditional stock market since the start of the Middle East conflict of 2026.
According to SoSoValue data as of May 29, the total net assets of 13 U.S. spot ETFs stand at $94.25 billion, equivalent to 6.45% of Bitcoin's total market capitalization. Of this amount, $58.11 billion is managed by BlackRock's IBIT fund.
Despite the current nine-day streak of outflows, cumulative net inflows into the sector since launch remain at $55.79 billion, keeping the positions of most large institutional players profitable.
Dan Burgin
