One year ago today, Gary Gensler and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) finalized and approved a bitcoin spot exchange traded fund (ETF) to go live the next day. These ETFs would go on to become the best performing ETFs in history, with BlackRock's $IBIT ETF leading the charge, bringing in over $52 billion. inflow alone
I feel like a lot of people are afraid to admit this, or just don't want to, but ETFs were the most important moment in Bitcoin over 2024. Looking back on the year, yes it feels like everything that went in. Bitcoin's favor was downstream from these approvals. Let me explain.
The six major events that occurred in 2024 were as follows:
- Spot Bitcoin ETF approved by the SEC
- Donald Trump promises the US to accept Bitcoin
- MicroStrategy and other corporate adoption of Bitcoin
- Milestone price $100,000
- Gary Gensler Resigns from SEC
- The copy
When BlackRock to file for his ETF near the tail end of the bear market in 2023, which marked the beginning of the new bull market for me. We immediately saw a stampede of other big fund managers rush to bid on the ETF as well and the price of Bitcoin has since gone up – the price of bitcoin was $24,900 when BlackRock introduced the ETF, then it was $46,000 when it was approved, and today we are sitting at just under $100,000.
The main reason for interest and increased acceptance of Bitcoin is its price, not utility. Big price increases bring in the biggest eyeballs, new pools of capital, and generate more interest in the asset in general. When bitcoin goes down in price, all the tourists leave and only the HODLers remain.
A Bitcoin ETF helped boost the price in historic fashion by setting the stage for Donald Trump to embrace it. Bitcoin was no longer just a magical internet currency for a small crowd of people on the internet, it was now backed by the world's largest asset managers in BlackRock and Fidelity . The massive inflow into these products was like a tsunami, showing the real demand for bitcoin and the new direction our country was headed. financial aspect. It showed that this is an industry that is going to grow tremendously, and I believe that Trump, like many other politicians including senators and congressmen, realized that that they were better off fighting with us than against us.
Now with the price soaring with the support of the biggest asset managers, and a new pro-Bitcoin administration coming into the White House, this gave the green light for MicroStrategy and other corporations to dive inββββ deeper into the fund. And that's exactly what happened.
Michael Saylor ramped up Bitcoin buying at MicroStrategy like never before, and it shows no signs of slowing down in 2025. Its stock outperformed bitcoin on the attention of several other public companies that halved copy of theBitcoin For Corporations' strategy, all putting more buying pressure on bitcoin, giving more progress to the asset. MicroStrategy is raising more than $42 billion to buy more bitcoin for everyone who doesn't own it yet – this massive increase in demand and regulatory certainty is sending bitcoin collectors into a frenzy FOMO.
All this together, including the halving event where the production of newly created bitcoin was cut in half to only 3.125 BTC per block, put us at a new all-time high above $108,000. The strong buying demand on most days completely sets the amount of new coins mined, further increasing the price. Just the other day, the BlackRock ETF alone bought over 6,078 bitcoins and miners only made 450 new bitcoins. There aren't enough bitcoins to go around for everyone, and they don't make more than 21 million coins.
NEW: πΊπΈ BlackRock Place #Bitcoin ETF bought 6,078 bitcoins today, and miners only mined 450 new bitcoins.
Completely. barely pic.twitter.com/KkHGpP2WAL
– Nikolaus Hoffman (@NikolausHoff) January 8, 2025
The success of these ETFs and a change in the presidential administration brought bad news to the SEC and anti-Bitcoin regulators and politicians. Gary Gensler, who helped maintain the spot ETFs license for years, is officially leaving the SEC. The two Democratic commissioners on the SEC who voted against approval are also leaving the commission. And it looks like Bitcoin is now being set up to thrive in the United States over the next four years without being attacked by the regulators and politicians who have held this industry back. how long.
The ETFs were a huge moment for this industry, and it would be very likely that things would have turned out very differently if they had not been approved. The price of bitcoin would likely be much lower than it is today, and we might even have a different winner in the US presidential election if they were not approved. So many good things went into Bitcoin this year, and it was all downstream from the ETF deal.
This article is a Take. The views expressed are entirely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.
