Bitcoin ETF Flows Reignite as BTC-USD Reclaims the $90,000 Handle
BTC-USD Price Action: From Sub-$90K Range to a $91,000 Rebound
Spot Bitcoin (BTC-USD) has shifted back into offensive mode at the start of 2026. After trading for days in a tight $87,000–$90,000 band, price pushed to roughly $90,925 on the first U.S. trading day of the year and closed around $89,925. Over the weekend, BTC-USD extended the move, with quotes circling $91,000–$91,400 and an intraday range near $89,987–$91,670. The move is not a new all-time high, but it is meaningful: Bitcoin is still about 28% below the October 2025 record, yet it has clearly re-established $90,000 as a tactical pivot rather than a hard ceiling.
Derivatives data confirm that the breakout hurt shorts. More than 5,000 traders were liquidated on Jan. 2 alone as price jumped through $90,000, with short positions taking the bulk of the losses. At the same time, the broader crypto tape remains jittery: the Crypto Fear & Greed Index is back in Extreme Fear territory with a score around 25, and the late-2025 deleveraging still hangs over sentiment. That mix—price breaking higher against a fearful backdrop—is exactly the environment where ETF flow data becomes decisive for the next leg.
Spot Bitcoin ETF Inflows: $471M Net Buying Resets the Tone
The first U.S. trading day of 2026 delivered a clean regime switch in spot Bitcoin ETF flows. U.S.-listed products pulled in roughly $471–472 million of net inflows on Jan. 2, the strongest single session in about 35 trading days and the biggest since early November 2025. Net assets for the complex jumped to roughly $116–117 billion, up from about $113.3 billion at the end of 2025, reflecting both fresh capital and underlying BTC-USD appreciation.
This session matters because it comes immediately after a two-month stretch of net outflows. Between November and December 2025, spot Bitcoin ETFs bled more than $4.5 billion as BTC rolled over from its October peak and derivatives markets saw the largest single-day liquidation event on record. Even through that turbulence, aggregate U.S. crypto ETFs still finished 2025 with around $31.77 billion of net inflows, including about $21.4 billion into spot Bitcoin funds, but the pace had clearly cooled from the $35.2 billion that Bitcoin ETFs absorbed in 2024.
The Jan. 2 print effectively says the buyer is back. It is not yet confirmation of a full trend resumption, but it breaks the pattern where any bounce in BTC-USD was immediately sold into by ETF investors.
IBIT Leadership: BlackRock’s Flagship Reclaims the Flow Crown
Within the Bitcoin ETF stack, BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) is again the center of gravity. On the first trading day of 2026, IBIT alone absorbed roughly $287–288 million of net inflows, accounting for well over half of the total Bitcoin ETF demand. That was its largest daily haul since early October 2025, when single-day flows briefly exceeded $400 million.
Other large issuers participated but did not dominate. Fidelity’s Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund (FBTC) added on the order of $88 million, Bitwise’s BITB drew roughly $41–42 million, and a cluster of smaller vehicles posted modest positive prints. Legacy products such as GBTC shifted from being a structural seller in late 2025 to contributing positively at the margin, with a roughly 2.6% price gain on the day in parallel with spot.
The message from the flow distribution is clear: institutional and advisor-driven money is not abandoning IBIT; it is using BlackRock’s vehicle as the primary re-entry point after year-end tax rotation. When IBIT is pulling $250–300M in a single day, it shows that large allocators are comfortable adding BTC-USD exposure at $90,000, not just below $70,000.
Cross-Asset Flows: Ether and XRP ETFs Add Another $188M
The ETF demand spike is not confined to BTC-USD. On the same session that spot Bitcoin ETFs drew about $471.3 million, U.S. spot Ether ETFs booked approximately $174–175 million of net inflows. That was their strongest day in about 15 trading sessions, eclipsed only by a mid-December burst near $177.7 million.
Regulated XRP products joined in, albeit at a smaller scale, with spot XRP ETFs drawing around $13.6 million on the day. When you aggregate across assets, spot Bitcoin and Ether ETFs together took in roughly $646 million of net inflows on the first trading day of 2026. XRP adds a thin but important layer on top of that.
The cross-asset pattern matters: investors are not simply buying BTC-USD as a one-off hedge. They are rebuilding exposure across the main “regulated rails” of crypto—Bitcoin as macro collateral, ETH-USD as smart-contract infrastructure, and XRP-USD as a regulated cross-border payments play. That broad base lowers the odds that Bitcoin flows are just a brief short-covering spike.
2025 ETF Context: Big Year in Dollars, Slower Than 2024 in Bitcoin
For Bitcoin ETF flows, 2025 was still a strong year in absolute terms but a clear deceleration from launch year dynamics. Across all U.S. digital asset ETFs, net inflows reached roughly $31.77 billion. Spot Bitcoin funds contributed about $21.4 billion, with Ether ETFs and other products making up the balance.
That compares to roughly $35.2 billion of net inflows into Bitcoin ETFs alone in 2024. The drop is not surprising: the first approval year always benefits from structural adoption, “first allocation” flows, and extensive media coverage. By 2025, ETF buying was less about first-time access and more about tactical positioning—adding on dips, trimming into spikes, and rotating within portfolios based on rates, equities, and volatility.
The late-year outflows in November–December 2025 must be read in that context. They were driven by declining prices, tax-loss harvesting, and risk-off positioning, not by structural abandonment. Industry executives explicitly pointed to institutions selling BTC-USD in Q4 2025 to harvest losses and reset basis, with the expectation that allocations would rebuild in early 2026. The first trading day’s $471M net buying is consistent with that narrative rather than contradicting it.
Macro Backdrop: Rates, Data and Why ETF Flows Now Drive the Tape
The ETF surge is unfolding into a macro calendar that can still swing risk appetite sharply. The near-term catalysts are straightforward:
A heavy block of delayed U.S. data following the government shutdown, with the U.S. Employment Situation report scheduled for Friday, Jan. 9, 8:30 a.m. ET, will reset the labor narrative and the path for rate cuts.
The Federal Reserve meets again on Jan. 27–28, with markets debating how quickly policymakers will move after last year’s easing step and recent communication that further cuts “could be some way off” as officials evaluate incoming data.
Yields have already backed up from their late-2025 lows, and the dollar has firmed. Both moves usually weigh on high-beta assets, including BTC-USD, which is why the renewed drive in ETF inflows at the same time is notable. If Treasuries sell off further and the dollar continues higher without ETF demand, Bitcoin would be vulnerable to another flush back through $90,000. Instead, the first week of 2026 shows investors adding BTC-USD exposure despite macro uncertainty, not because macro suddenly turned friendly.
Market Positioning: Tax-Loss Harvesting, Re-Risking and Fear & Greed at 25
Positioning through Q4 2025 was dominated by de-risking and tax engineering. ETF flow data, whale movements, and derivatives positioning all show that institutions were net sellers into the late-2025 drawdown, crystalizing losses after the October high and balancing books before year-end. Large holders shifted spot BTC-USD into ETFs at different points, then rotated back out as prices sagged, creating the $4.5 billion+ outflow pattern in November–December.
Into early 2026, that playbook has flipped. Executives at crypto platforms describe institutions “loading up” again after tax-loss harvesting, with spot Bitcoin ETFs the preferred vehicle for re-entry. The Fear & Greed Index sitting at Extreme Fear (25) while ETFs log their strongest inflow in more than a month is consistent with that: sentiment surveys are backward-looking; allocation data is forward-looking.
In other words, the market is still talking about the October liquidation event and December’s slump, while the money is quietly rebuilding BTC-USD exposure through IBIT and peers at $90,000–$91,000. That divergence is exactly what you want to see if you are bullish over the next few months.
BTC-USD and Crypto Equities: Coinbase, Strategy Stock and the Miners
The spot Bitcoin ETF rebound is already transmitting into crypto-linked equities. On the first U.S. session of 2026, Coinbase Global closed up roughly 4.6% around $236.53, tightly tracking the move in BTC-USD and its impact on trading volumes and custody revenue. The article’s “Strategy” stock gained about 3.5% to roughly $157.16, reflecting renewed appetite for listed proxies on the Bitcoin balance-sheet trade. At the high-beta end, miners Marathon Digital and Riot Platforms jumped about 10.2% and 12.0% respectively, quickly repricing leverage to Bitcoin’s upside.
Because these equities are highly sensitive to ETF flow, their response gives added confirmation that the move is more than a random weekend pop. When spot BTC-USD rallies but ETFs see outflows, crypto stocks often lag or fade. This time, ETFs bought $471M of Bitcoin, price broke $90,000, and miners ripped higher—classic risk-on behavior consistent with sustained ETF demand rather than a dead-cat bounce.
Risk Factors: Structural Bear Claims, MSCI Index Decision and Geopolitics
The bullish case built on ETF flows does not erase the downside. Analysts calling BTC-USD a “structural bear market” point to:
The fact that price remains roughly 28% below its October 2025 record, even after clearing $90,000 again.
The October derivatives flush, which was the largest single-day liquidation event in crypto history and left leveraged long interest far more cautious.
The persistent presence of macro headwinds—higher real yields, sticky inflation risk, and a Fed that has not committed to an aggressive cutting cycle.
There are also event-specific catalysts that could inject volatility. Around Jan. 15, MSCI is set to decide whether to include digital-asset treasuries (public companies holding significant BTC-USD on balance sheet) in its global indices—an outcome that could either unlock incremental demand or leave some bulls disappointed. Geopolitical risk is live as well: reports of U.S. military action and air strikes, such as the Venezuela headlines that coincided with recent price moves, can briefly push Bitcoin higher as a perceived hedge but also trigger flight-to-cash episodes if liquidity in risk assets dries up.
Finally, the ETF flow story itself cuts both ways. The same vehicles that added more than $470M of net long exposure in one day can, in a risk-off shock, deliver symmetrical outflows. If IBIT, FBTC, and peers pivot back to net selling while BTC-USD trades near $90,000, the break above resistance would quickly lose credibility.
BTC-USD Verdict: Bitcoin ETF Momentum Justifies a Cautious Buy Bias
Putting all of the data together—price, flows, positioning, and macro—the balance of evidence currently favors a bullish but disciplined stance on BTC-USD.
Price has reclaimed the $90,000 handle, printed a local high around $90,925–$91,000, and forced significant short liquidations without euphoria in sentiment gauges. Spot Bitcoin ETFs have just logged their largest daily net inflow in roughly 35 sessions, at about $471M, with IBIT alone drawing roughly $287M. Cross-asset ETF demand adds another $174.5M in Ether and $13.6M in XRP, pushing combined spot BTC+ETH flows to roughly $646M on day one of 2026.
Against a macro backdrop that is still cautious, institutions appear to be re-risking into Bitcoin via ETFs after Q4 2025 tax-loss harvesting and de-leveraging. Crypto-linked equities—Coinbase, the “Strategy” stock, and the miners—are confirming the move with double-digit percentage surges in some cases.
On that basis, the flow and price structure argue for BTC-USD as a Buy with a cautious risk framework, not a full-throttle chase. Above $90,000, ETF flows and spot structure support upside toward prior ranges in the mid-$90,000s and beyond, as long as:
Net ETF inflows remain positive on a weekly basis.
IBIT and other core funds continue to absorb dips rather than dump into strength.
Macro data and the Jan. 27–28 Fed meeting do not trigger a violent repricing in rates that forces a broad risk-off move.
If those conditions hold, the current ETF-driven base looks more like the start of a new advance than the last gasp of a fading cycle—justifying a Buy label with tight downside levels around $87,000–$88,000 and a constant eye on daily flow data.
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