In a landmark day for cryptocurrency markets, the launch of the United States' first spot Bitcoin ETFs garnered an impressive $4.5 billion in trading volume, as reported by Yahoo Finance. This robust market response was witnessed on the very first day of trading for these ETFs.

The GBTC, which just transitioned into an ETF on Wednesday, was a significant player, accounting for about half of the day's total volume. Not far behind, a new offering from BlackRock captured around a quarter of the day's trades.

This flurry of activity kicked off early, with over $1 billion in trades recorded within the first half-hour of trading on Thursday. The background to this exciting trading day was set by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) recent approval of a range of spot Bitcoin ETFs, marking a significant regulatory milestone.

In related news, Hashdex disclosed in an afternoon announcement that while it had been granted permission to reclassify its Bitcoin futures fund as a spot product, the official registration for this change is still under review by the SEC. Hashdex stated that it plans to rename the fund and adjust its investment strategy to incorporate direct Bitcoin holdings in the future. However, the firm refrained from providing additional details at this time.

Leading the trading volumes were the ETFs from Grayscale and BlackRock, trading around 56 million and 38 million shares respectively. GBTC closed the day with approximately $2.3 billion in trade volume, while BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) concluded the day just over the $1 billion mark.

This trading volume is considered unprecedented for ETFs, with Bloomberg Intelligence analyst noting it as possibly the most remarkable debut in ETF history.

In comparison, the initial trading volumes of IBIT closely mirrored those of the ProShares Bitcoin Strategy ETF (BITO), the first Bitcoin futures ETF, which saw about $950 million in trade volume on its launch day, October 19, 2021. It's noteworthy that BITO did not have the challenge of competing product launches on its debut day.

Blockworks