BlackRock is on course to become Bitcoin’s biggest holder.
That’s right… a stalwart of Wall Street may soon overtake Satoshi Nakamoto’s trove of the world’s most valuable cryptocurrency.
In just 16 months, Wall Street’s largest Bitcoin exchange-traded fund has quickly amassed 664,954 Bitcoin worth about $70 billion.
And it’s only a matter of time before it overtakes the 1.1 million Bitcoin long believed to be held by the network’s pseudonymous creator, says Eric Balchunas, Bloomberg Intelligence’s ETF analyst.
“IBIT is likely to pass Satoshi as the world’s biggest holder by the end of next year,” Balchunas wrote on X on Tuesday.
“It’s a testament to the power of convenience, low cost, liquidity, and trust that the ETF brings to table.”
‘Satoshi-level understanding’
The coins attributed to Satoshi Nakamoto have never been confirmed to be theirs.
That’s because the 1.1 million stash comes from an early day miner who showed a deep understanding of Bitcoin — “Satoshi-level understanding” wrote Bitcoin OG Jameson Lopp — but who has never claimed or moved them.
The speed and scale of BlackRock’s ETF shows the dramatic shift in Bitcoin’s ownership landscape.
Before Wall Street and other giants such as Robinhood got into crypto, Bitcoin was mostly a place for risk-tolerant investors who navigated poor user experiences and insecure wallets.
But many investors, especially older ones eager for exposure to crypto while not sold on the idea of a crypto-native platform, are using traditional brokers to buy digital assets.
Longstanding credibility
It’s the reason why other Wall Street behemoths such as Charles Schwab and Morgan Stanley are now exploring crypto products for their clients.
BlackRock, which has $11 trillion in assets under management, not only offers Bitcoin exposure on the cheap within its existing app, it also enjoys longstanding credibility with its clients.
Indeed, institutional demand is surging.
Across all Bitcoin ETFs, the total assets under management has surpassed 1.1 million Bitcoin and is now worth about $121 billion, according to data collected by Dragonfly head data scientist Hildebert Moulié, known by his online pseudonym Hildobby.
That’s more than 5% of all the Bitcoin that will ever exist — and this doesn’t even take into account the coins held by Bitcoin treasury companies.
Bitcoin at $200,000
Bernstein analysts have also said that Wall Street will replace Satoshi as Bitcoin climbs to $200,000.
For Balchunas, there’s a bigger story brewing behind BlackRock’s pursuit for top spot: how fast IBIT has earned a spot among the largest ETFs in the world.
Barely 16 months old, IBIT is the youngest among the top 25 biggest ETFs by a factor of nine.
“It’s like an infant hanging out with teenagers and twenty-somethings,” said Balchunas. “Quite possibly the most insane IBIT stat yet.”
Pedro Solimano is a markets correspondent based in Buenos Aires. Got a tip? Email him at [email protected].
