VanEck’s spot Bitcoin ETF saw its average daily trading volume increase 14x the day before the company implemented a fee cut, reducing the cost of entry from 0.25% to 0.2%.
According to Bloomberg’s Eric Balchunas, the VanEck Bitcoin Trust ETF (HODL) recorded over $258 million in trading volume from 32,000 individual traders on February 20th. Balchunas noted that VanEck’s trading volume and number of traders are well above the average for the company’s new exchange-traded fund.
I have never seen such a sudden explosion of grassroots deals.
Eric Balchunas of X
According to Yahoo Finance, VanEck’s previous high was about $25 million, recorded on January 11, the Bitcoin ETF’s first day of trading in the United States. Since then, VanEck has outpaced BlackRock, Fidelity, and Grayscale in volume and net flow.
However, issuers have tried to remain competitive by lowering fees. According to VanEck’s filing with the U.S. SEC, the fee cuts will take effect on February 21, allowing it, along with Fidelity, to offer lower fees than spot BTC ETF leader BlackRock, which charges 0.25%.
The company also liquidated its Bitcoin futures ETF to consolidate its resources on its latest cryptocurrency-based products. VanEck will also allocate 5% of HODL ETF profits to support Bitcoin core developers.
A similar strategy was implemented in the Ethereum Futures ETF, as the issuer pledged 10% of its profits to the Ethereum Protocol Guild over the next 10 years. VanEck also has a pending Ethereum ETF filing with the SEC.