BlackRock's iShares Ethereum Trust (ETHA) has become the first spot Ether exchange traded fund (ETF) to attract $1 billion U.S. of investor capital.
The BlackRock Ethereum Trust is the first of about a dozen such ETFs to cross the $1 billion U.S. threshold since they launched in June of this year.
The news that BlackRock has attracted more than $1 billion U.S. of capital is a positive development in what has otherwise been an underwhelming debut for spot Ethereum ETFs.
The Ethereum ETFs have seen cumulative net outflows of nearly $450 million U.S. and have underperformed when compared to the spot Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs that debuted in January.
BlackRock’s Ethereum Trust now holds more investor capital than the next three biggest spot Ethereum ETFs combined.
Fidelity’s Ethereum ETF (FETH), the second largest, currently holds a total of $367 million U.S.
Many of the spot Ethereum ETFs have attracted less than $60 million U.S. since making their market debut two months ago.
By comparison, the first month of spot Bitcoin ETFs saw daily net inflows of about $125 million U.S. with several funds attracting more than $1 billion U.S. of investor capital by mid-March.
Analysts say the debut of the spot Ethereum ETFs have been hurt by a downturn in the overall cryptocurrency market in recent weeks.
Ethereum’s price has declined 25% in the last month to trade at $2,630 U.S. per digital token.
