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Bitcoin ETF Outflows Made June the Worst Month Yet

The 13-day Bitcoin ETF outflow streak did not cap the damage. June became the worst month, then IBIT led a $3.5 billion August rebound.

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4 months ago

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Spot Bitcoin ETF outflows ran for 13 straight sessions from May 15 to June 3, draining $4.33 billion and 59,351 bitcoin. Galaxy Research logged those coins, and the run was the longest since the funds listed on January 11, 2024.

April had been the strongest month of 2026, with $1.97 billion of inflows. The live question after the streak was whether June would calm down. It did not.

The 13-Day Streak Was Only the Opening Act

The dollar figure got the headlines. The coin count was heavier. Galaxy’s 20-day window reached $5.42 billion and 73,080 bitcoin, the largest reading it had on both measures, while the 7-day and 10-day windows set records at 39,338 and 42,941 bitcoin.

That earlier 13-day outflow streak already had a name attached to it. Eric Balchunas, a senior ETF analyst, put the prior month’s withdrawals near $4.4 billion and said the print had shoved 2026 flows back into the red after the funds had worked to get them positive.

He also pointed at a floor. BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) and a few peers were still positive for the year, and lifetime net inflows sat near $55 billion, less than $10 billion below the high-water mark.

The streak itself broke on June 4, when the complex printed a $3.0 million inflow. That was a rounding error against what was already gone, and it did not hold.

Bitcoin ETF outflows 13-day streak $4.33 billion
June Bitcoin ETF worst monthly outflow after streak

How Much Did Bitcoin ETFs Lose in June 2026?

US spot bitcoin ETFs lost $4.5 billion in June across 21 trading days, with 18 outflow sessions and only 3 inflow days, according to the Farside series. That is the worst calendar month since launch. The daily average was -$214.8 million, and the ugliest session was June 25 at -$696.3 million.

May had already taken $2.4 billion across 20 sessions (6 inflows, 14 outflows), with May 27 the single worst day of that month at -$733.4 million. Stack the two months and the funds shed $6.9 billion going into summer.

THE MONTHLY SCOREBOARD AFTER APRIL

Month Net flow Sessions In / out
May 2026 -$2.4 billion 20 6 / 14
June 2026 -$4.5 billion 21 3 / 18
July 2026 +$172.4 million 22 13 / 9
August 2026 +$3.5 billion 21 16 / 5
September (through 11) +$307.4 million 8 3 / 5

Part of that June selling sat inside a wider rotation that included a SpaceX IPO siphoning crypto capital. Paul Howard, senior director at Wincent, said the ETF outflows looked like a broader macro rotation rather than a break in bitcoin’s long-term case.

July then stopped the bleed without repairing it. The funds took in $172.4 million over 22 sessions (13 in, 9 out), a daily average of only $7.8 million, and still suffered a -$424.7 million day on July 13.

IBIT Took the Outflows and Then the Bid

The June tape was not a shared sacrifice. Adding BlackRock’s daily prints gives IBIT about $3.55 billion of that month’s withdrawals, or 79% of the $4.5 billion total. On June 1, 2, and 3 alone, IBIT printed -$440.3 million, -$388.6 million, and -$342.3 million.

That is the cost of being the liquid vehicle. When the complex later bought, IBIT took the other side of the same door. On August 20, the category’s best session of the summer at +$606.3 million, IBIT accounted for $503.0 million. On September 3, the largest day since January at +$730.8 million on Farside’s ledger, IBIT took $454.0 million.

THE LIFETIME BOOK BY FUND

  • IBIT (BlackRock): $64.00 billion of net inflows, 0.25% fee, about $60.60 billion of assets, or 62% of the group’s $97.58 billion.
  • FBTC (Fidelity): $10.29 billion of net inflows, still a distant second.
  • GBTC (Grayscale): $27.78 billion of net outflows, the 1.50% fee still doing the slow work it has done since conversion.
  • BTC Mini, BITB, ARKB: $2.92 billion, $2.12 billion, and $1.23 billion of net inflows, useful but not the print that moves the tape.

Read the headline total and you miss that split. GBTC and ARK 21Shares can print red on a day IBIT is still taking cash, which is what happened on September 8, when IBIT was +$10.7 million against a -$46.6 million complex.

$3.5 Billion Came Back in August

August flipped the year. The funds took in $3.5 billion over 21 sessions, 16 of them inflows, at a $167.8 million daily average. That beat April’s $1.97 billion and became 2026’s best month. Nine straight inflow days ran from August 17 through August 27.

The cash-market tape did not always agree. Bitcoin tagged about $82,000 around the September 3 print, then a jobs report shoved it back under $80,000. The funds still took $174.6 million on September 4. The bid sat in the wrapper while payrolls shoved the price around.

Assets across the group were near $101 billion in that window, with the products holding about 657,000 bitcoin. Through September 11, bitcoin itself traded around $77,124.

Bitcoin ETF Holders Did Not Repeat Gold’s 40% Exit

Balchunas had already reached for gold when the 13-day streak was fresh. He argued the bitcoin holder base looked firmer than the one that used SPDR Gold Shares after that product’s early rush.

Not bad at all for this type of drawdown and negative sentiment, gold went down like this a few yrs after GLD debuted and 40% of the assets left, much stronger holders here so far). But yeah, to quote Henry Hill, this is the bad times

Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst, on X

GLD listed on November 18, 2004. Gold then rose for nine straight calendar years, and the wrappers pulled in tens of billions, before the gold ETFs’ $41.6 billion 2013 exodus hit worldwide products. That later drain is the analog he was using, not the launch week.

The global gold ETF holdings and flows series still swings in both directions years after listing. Bitcoin’s wrappers are younger, and they have already shown they can spit out $4.5 billion in a month without handing back 40% of the book.

They also have not recaptured the high-water mark Balchunas flagged in early June. They have only climbed back to the same neighborhood he cited when he said lifetime inflows were still near $55 billion.

Four Red Sessions Land Ahead of the Fed

September opened with a -$236.5 million day, then the $730.8 million spike, then $174.6 million more on September 4. Month to date through September 11 the complex is still +$307.4 million, because those two green sessions were large enough to cover the rest.

The latest tape is weaker. From September 8 through September 11 the funds printed four outflow days totaling about $463 million. September 10 was -$282.7 million, and ARKB alone was -$164.3 million that session. September 11 slowed to -$13.2 million.

Farside Investors’ daily Bitcoin ETF flow table through September 11 puts lifetime net inflows at $55.22 billion. That is almost the same running total Balchunas cited at the bottom of the streak. Year-to-date 2026 was still about $1 billion in the red as of September 6, before those four sessions dug a little deeper.

The Fed meets on September 16. Four modest red days into a policy week is a different animal from 13 straight sessions and a $4.5 billion month, and it reads like positioning, not a second May.

The Ether Side of the Same Risk-Off Tape

When the bitcoin streak was running, spot ether ETFs had their own record: 17 straight outflow days. That pairing was the tell for a broad risk-off move, not a bitcoin-only story.

The two products have not marched in lockstep since. Ether funds later snapped an eight-week outflow run in July and took in about $338 million that month. In late August they strung together 10 inflow sessions near $1.42 billion, with BlackRock’s ETHA taking about $1.02 billion of the haul.

Recent sessions have split again, with ether products taking money in weeks bitcoin products have leaked. The June question was whether conviction would hold in the bitcoin wrappers. The summer’s answer is that the wrappers held, the money concentrated in IBIT, and the category’s lifetime book is sitting on $55.22 billion, with IBIT at $64.00 billion and GBTC still $27.78 billion in the hole, when the Fed walks in on September 16.

Disclaimer: This article is news reporting and analysis of published ETF flow figures, and it is for information only. It is not investment advice, a recommendation to buy or sell bitcoin, ether, IBIT, GBTC, or any other fund or token, and it is not a prediction of returns. Readers should consult a licensed financial adviser or investment professional who can consider their own objectives and risk limits before acting. Flow totals, assets, and prices reflect the named trackers through September 11, 2026, and those figures can be revised or reversed on the next session.

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Harry is the editor of Oton Technology, an independent site he owns and edits, covering the part of technology that people actually have to act on. After ten years in journalism, first reporting and then editing, he works from primary material by habit: the advisory rather than the write up of it, the filing rather than the press release, the changelog rather than the launch video. Every figure in an article carries its source and its date, and where a number comes from a vendor or an analyst model rather than a count, he says so plainly instead of letting it stand as established fact. What he leaves out is anything he could not verify himself, which on a beat full of unnamed supply chain claims removes a great deal. That standard applies across all the sections the site publishes for an international audience, from artificial intelligence and security to phones, computers, gaming, crypto and the software businesses depend on. He corrects errors in the open and labels them, because a site that hides its mistakes is asking readers to trust the rest on nothing.

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