Digital Asset Funds Hit by 5th Week of Outflows

Investors pulled money out of cryptocurrency funds for a fifth straight week, reflecting the bearish market mood as bitcoin suffers one of its worst-ever starts to a year.

Digital-asset investment products saw $73 million of outflows during the seven days through Jan. 14, according to a report published Monday by the crypto firm CoinShares. The redemptions accumulate to $532 million over the five weeks, cutting industrywide assets under management across all funds to $56.1 billion.

Investment funds focused on bitcoin (BTC), the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market value, accounted for $55 million of the outflows. Ethereum-related funds saw outflows totaling $30 million.

However, the report noted that on a daily basis, for the first time this year, there were inflows on Wednesday and Friday of last week.

“This is suggesting the bearish sentiment is beginning to abate after recent positive price moves,” according to the report.

Recent price action still looks relatively dour, with bitcoin down 2.5% in the last seven days, trading around $41,000, and ether (ETH), the native cryptocurrency of the Ethereum blockchain, down 3.5% at $3,100.

Going against the trend was Solana, the layer 1 blockchain protocol, apparently an investor favorite with inflows totaling $5.4 million. Solana-focused funds have only seen two individual weeks of outflows since August 2021, according to CoinShares.