Crypto Funds See Outflows as Bitcoin Gets More 'Interest-Rate Sensitive'

Crypto funds had a second straight week of outflows as bitcoin became more sensitive to interest rates and investors adjust to the the Federal Reserve’s hawkish turn, CoinShares reported Tuesday.

Across the industry, crypto funds had $97 million in net outflows in the seven days through Apr. 15, according to CoinShares. Of that, 88% came from European funds in a shift from the prior week when the majority of the $134 million in outflows came from U.S. funds. The $134 million in outflows was the most since January.

“We have witnessed bitcoin becoming increasingly interest-rate ‘sensitive’ over the course of 2022 in a similar way to other stores of value," CoinShares wrote in its report.

So-called "short" bitcoin investment products – such as exchange-traded products that provide an inverse to the cryptocurrency's performance – saw $1.8 million in outflows last week after a few weeks of inflows.

Bitcoin-related products saw outflows of $73 million, claiming the majority of the outflows. Trading volume of bitcoin funds was at half of the yearly average at $651 million, echoing the shrinking overall bitcoin trading volume. It was 32% off the year’s weekly average.

Bitcoin (BTC), the largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, has traded at around $40,000 since early April. It went up to over $41,000 on Apr. 13, but fell back to $40,000 later in the week.

Funds focused on ethereum (ETH) saw $27 million in outflows, more than the previous week’s $15.3 million in outflows.

Both Cardano and Solana-focused funds saw outflows of $700,000, while multi-asset funds saw inflows of $5.3 million.

Broken down by providers, funds managed by ETC Group had the most outflows with $95.9 million, while 3iQ’s $19.2 million of outflows were the second most.