By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Bitcoin investment products and funds registered outflows for a second consecutive week, according to data from digital asset manager CoinShares released on Monday, highlighting investors’ cautious sentiment on the cryptocurrency sector as prices continued to stall.
Bitcoin outflows hit $10.4 million in the week ended July 16, after outflows of $6.9 million the previous week. For the month of July, bitcoin outflows amounted to $15 million, though inflows for the year were still a robust $4.2 billion.
The overall crypto sector had net inflows of $2.9 million in the latest week, data showed.
The world’s largest cryptocurrency in terms of market capitalization was down 12.1% in price this month. On Monday, it was testing a key support of $30,000 and was last down 3.4% at $30,694.
“Bitcoin is looking precarious and is trading lower alongside global markets as concerns of economic recovery rise,” said Pankaj Balani, chief executive officer at derivatives trading platform Delta Exchange.
“The volatility has also started to spike up… We can see sharp moves on the downside if bitcoin breaks below $30,000 convincingly,” he added.
That said, James Butterfill, investment strategist at CoinShares, pointed out that bitcoin outflows last week were minimal relative to May and June this year. He also believes that the timing of some of the crypto investment product launches, in which investors gained access for the first time, has led to recent profit-taking.
Ether-based investment products and funds, the token used for the Ethereum blockchain, had $11.7 million in net inflows last week. So far this year, ether inflows were close to $1 billion.
Ether’s price, however, was down 20% against the U.S. dollar, and was last 4% weaker at $1,819.
Grayscale remains the largest crypto asset manager, but has seen its assets under supervision slide further, to $27.681 billion.
CoinShares, the second-biggest digital asset manager, saw its AUM dip to $3.1 billion from $3.3 billion the previous week.
(Reporting by Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss; Editing by Dan Grebler)
