U.S. Spot Bitcoin ETFs See Massive 175% Surge in Inflows, Reaching $40.6 Billion

U.S.-listed spot Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have experienced a remarkable 175% increase in year-over-year inflows in early 2025. From January 13 to February 5, the funds attracted a total of $4.4 billion in net inflows, a significant jump from the $1.6 billion recorded in the same period in 2024.

The success of these spot Bitcoin ETFs has been unprecedented, accumulating over $40.6 billion in total net inflows to date. Comparatively, BlackRock’s iShares Trust (IBIT) has also gathered $40.7 billion in net inflows. However, the total inflow for all 11 spot BTC ETFs stands at $40.6 billion, despite Grayscale’s GBTC seeing outflows of $21.9 billion.

There’s ongoing speculation about whether these inflows reflect a directional long position in Bitcoin or are part of a strategy known as basis trading. In basis trading, investors go long on the spot market while simultaneously selling futures contracts that trade at a premium to the spot price. Currently, there is a premium of approximately 10%, which is expected to diminish as the spot price aligns with the futures contracts near expiration.

Data from Glassnode reveals that open interest on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), the leading platform for such trades, has dropped from 180,099 BTC to 168,549 BTC since the beginning of the year. This decline suggests that the significant inflows are not mainly driven by basis trading strategies.