U.S. Ethereum Funds See $1.07 Billion in Outflows Over 15 October Sessions
Key Facts
U.S. spot Ethereum exchange-traded funds recorded net outflows of about $1.07 billion over the 15 October sessions covered by CoinMarketCap’s report, with money leaving in 13 of them. The figure describes withdrawals during the period covered by the report and is not a final monthly total. The flows showed expanding pressure on regulated demand for Ethereum during the month. The report said the funds received about $14.9 million on October 21, their first inflow in six sessions. That temporary positive flow came amid a broader run of sessions with net withdrawals.
BlackRock’s ETHA accounted for about $954 million of the outflows recorded in October through the report’s date, the largest share of the roughly $1.07 billion total. This concentration put the fund at the center of withdrawals from U.S. spot products during the period. The pressure emerged early in the month: between September 29 and October 8, the funds recorded net outflows of $641 million over eight consecutive trading sessions. On October 26, an Investing.com analysis said spot ether funds had lost about $221 million in the week ending shortly before its publication, their fourth consecutive week of outflows. These figures show withdrawals continuing across different stages of October, though each report covers a different period.
CoinShares, as cited by CoinMarketCap, linked outflows from cryptocurrency funds to changing U.S. interest-rate expectations. It said higher expected rates raise real yields and the opportunity cost of holding an asset that pays no yield. The report added that consumer prices in September rose more than expected and that futures traders priced in further rate increases by the Federal Reserve. According to CoinShares’ interpretation, these factors provide context for weaker demand for assets that generate no direct yield. The report did not cite broad liquidations as the cause of the outflows.
The withdrawals coincided with weakness in Ethereum’s price during the sell-off covered by an Investing.com analysis on October 9. The analysis said the coin briefly fell to $2,406 on October 8, amid pressure on demand from funds and the broader market. It estimated Ethereum’s decline in the sell-off at about 11%, compared with about 6% for Bitcoin. In another reading of staking activity, the analysis said the amount of Ethereum waiting to exit staking exceeded 850,000 on October 2, after affected MetaMask validators began withdrawing following a precautionary measure. The data show concurrent market pressures, but do not by themselves prove that fund outflows caused the price decline or vice versa.
Meanwhile, a CoinMarketCap report citing validatorqueue.com said about 1.41 million ETH were waiting to enter staking, compared with about 71,000 waiting to exit, at 10:32 a.m. Eastern Time on the Thursday cited in the report. The gap reflects strong demand to lock up Ethereum through staking, alongside fund outflows. CryptoQuant contributor Amr Taha said, according to the report, that Ethereum had remained above $2,300 since late August through the time of the report. The report warned that renewed redemptions could weaken support behind the coin’s recovery. October therefore brought signals of withdrawals from funds alongside demand for staking, with neither cancelling out the other.
In trading, EL7 data showed Ethereum closed at $2,253.13 on October 29, then at $2,221 on October 30. Those closes put the price below $2,300 on both days, after CoinMarketCap reported that it had remained above that level since late August during the period covered. Closing-price data alone do not establish when the level was breached or its relationship to fund flows. The outflow figures in CoinMarketCap’s report cover 15 sessions through its publication date, while other analyses reported weekly totals and different periods. The final monthly total therefore remains outside what the published figure for those sessions establishes.