Collapse of Bitcoin ETF market share in Canada

Not everyone knows, but before the launch on the US stock exchanges of the new ETFs on Bitcoin spot, similar derivative products were already available in Canada. 

Indeed, on the Toronto Stock Exchange, Bitcoin spot ETFs made their debut at the beginning of 2021, that is, three years ago.

Even at the time it was a real boom, compared to the trading volumes of other stocks on the Toronto Stock Exchange, but it stopped at 165 million dollars. 

Instead, when they made their debut on the US stock exchanges on January 11th of this year, the total daily volume exceeded 2 billion dollars. 

After all, there is no comparison between the US stock exchanges like Nasdaq and NYSE, and the TSX (Toronto Stock Exchange). 

The price of Bitcoin

Interestingly, however, the price of BTC when the first ETFs on Bitcoin spot landed on the Toronto Stock Exchange in Canada were similar to current ones, because Bitcoin was hovering just above $50,000. 

After all, this beginning of 2024 in some ways resembles the beginning of 2021, even though 2024 is the year of the fourth halving while 2021 was the year following the third halving. 

It may not be a coincidence that when important ETFs on Bitcoin spot arrive on the stock exchange, the price of their underlying asset, namely BTC, rises. 

Actually, the 165 million dollars in trades of the Purpose Bitcoin ETF were really small compared to, for example, 2.4 billion dollars yesterday, but the impact that traditional exchanges are having on the price of BTC in recent years is becoming more and more evident.

The collapse of the market share of ETFs on Bitcoin spot in Canada

Until the landing on the US stock exchanges of the new ETFs on Bitcoin spot, in fact the Purpose Bitcoin ETF on the Toronto stock exchange was the most traded ETF on Bitcoin in the world.

Indeed, the overall market share of Canadian ETFs in the global market of spot cryptocurrency ETFs had grown to as much as 46%. There are now a total of six spot Bitcoin ETFs in Canada, with a total of $2.79 billion in assets under management.

With the arrival of the new ETFs in the USA, the situation has been overturned, and now the United States overwhelmingly dominate this market with a share of up to 83%.

In addition to the USA and Canada, there are ETFs on Bitcoin spot also in Germany, Switzerland, Brazil and Australia, as well as Bermuda, Jersey, Liechtenstein and Guernsey, and in the coming months they should also arrive in Hong Kong.

The overtaking of the USA over Canada has been remarkable, because compared to the 2.79 billion dollars of AUM for Canadian ETFs, the US ones have already reached the incredible amount of 34.78 billion dollars, divided into ten ETFs. 

It is worth noting that Canadian ETFs took three years to reach that figure, while US ETFs took a month and a half, although the bulk of that AUM is held by the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), which has been around for ten years but only took the form of an ETF in January. 

Now Canada has moved to second place in this ranking with 7.4% of the global market share.

The Toronto Stock Exchange

The Toronto Stock Exchange is not only the largest stock exchange in Canada, but it is also the tenth largest in the world in terms of equity securities. 

Obviously it is very far from NYSE and Nasdaq, but it is ahead of London or Frankfurt, as well as Zurich.

However, in terms of overall market capitalization of its securities, it is just behind the Hong Kong stock exchange, although in terms of trading volume it is actually much further behind. 

The NYSE (New York Stock Exchange), also known as the New York Stock Exchange often simply called Wall Street, has a total market capitalization of its listed stocks of over $27 trillion, and a daily trading volume of $1.4 trillion.

The Nasdaq has a market cap of 24.5 trillion and a daily trading volume of 1.2 trillion. 

The TSX stops at 3 trillion market cap, but above all at 0.1 trillion trading volume. For example, the Hong Kong stock exchange does almost double the daily volumes, with a market capitalization slightly higher than that of the Toronto stock exchange, while the London stock exchange exceeds 0.2 trillion trading volume with a market cap slightly lower than the TSX.

The Toronto Stock Exchange has been in existence since 1852, and specializes in mining and energy securities. 

Bitcoin ETFs: United States beats Canada

Currently there are 32 spot Bitcoin ETFs in the world listed on various exchanges, with a total AUM of about $42 billion. Taken together, they hold almost 840,000 BTC, which is 4% of the maximum Bitcoin supply. 

The largest is GBTC by Grayscale, with an AUM of almost 23 billion dollars, which is more than half of the total: its market share is 54.7%. However, the AUM of GBTC continues to decline, while those of IBIT by BlackRock and FBTC by Fidelity are growing significantly. 

Of the top 10 ETFs on Bitcoin spot, 5 are American, while 3 are European and the other 2 are Canadian. 

European ETFs are about to surpass Canadian ones, also because the latter were actually partly intended for the US market, which is now focusing on its own funds. 

From this ranking, Asia, and especially China, are actually left out, even though in spot markets it is second only to America.