Bitcoin has faced significant challenges throughout 2026, unable to sustain the peaks of over $126,000 per bitcoin attained in the previous year, despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s unexpected revelation regarding bitcoin. The bitcoin price has declined by over 50% since October; however, an unexpected shift from the Federal Reserve may soon alter this trajectory. Now, as the chief executive of the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, issues a 12-month bitcoin price prediction, a closely-watched analysts has said he expects the fleet of bitcoin exchange-traded funds will likely mean the bitcoin price “mirrors” gold’s history of “triumph and pain.” Analyst Eric Balchunas posted to X “Gold ETFs’ 22-year history may offer the closest roadmap yet for bitcoin ETF investors.”
The gold price has surged, resulting in a market capitalisation of nearly $28 trillion since the introduction of gold ETFs in 2004. “Both are wrappers around non-yielding stores of value that generate no cash flow, leaving investor sentiment—not earnings, coupons or government support, as with stocks and bonds—to drive performance,” Balchunas wrote. Balchunas pointed to gold seeing “both extremes,” over the last two decades, “briefly becoming the world’s largest ETF before spending eight years in doldrums trying to get back to that place.” Bitcoin ETFs “may be following the same script: spectacular gains, painful drawdowns and recoveries that may test investors’ patience,” Balchunas said, adding that, “each cycle for gold ETFs has increased the high water mark.” The spot bitcoin ETF debut, anticipated in early 2024 following over a decade of advocacy by crypto investors, has led to a select group of bitcoin funds emerging as some of the fastest-growing in history, as Wall Street seeks to capitalise on exposure to bitcoin.
Earlier this month, analysts with the Bitfinex exchange cautioned that a “shock” ETF outflow could potentially derail the bitcoin price recovery, which has risen by nearly 10% since dipping to lows of under $57,000 in early July. BlackRock’s IBIT, the largest bitcoin fund by net assets that dominates the bitcoin ETF field, has sold nearly 100,000 bitcoin in recent months to satisfy redemption requests, currently holding just over 733,000 bitcoin valued at just under $50 billion on behalf of investors. “I feel like there’s a spiritual parallel between gold and IBIT,” Balchunas said. “Gold got so popular so quickly that for one day in 2011 it was bigger than SPY [the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust], the biggest ETF in world. Then it went out of favor for years. IBIT, similarly reached $100 billion in assets for one day … and that ended up being the October [2025] top. Both have almost new new supply and so when the demand comes it can cause price explosions. Problem is that demand can be fickle and come in waves vs steady.”
Currently, bitcoin and crypto traders exhibit confidence in the resilience of demand for bitcoin exposure through ETFs, which appears to be mitigating the decline in bitcoin prices observed in recent months. “Institutional demand remains one of bitcoin’s key pillars,” Simon-Peter Massabni. “Spot bitcoin ETFs continue to attract steady investment inflows, while an increasing number of companies are incorporating digital assets into their portfolio diversification strategies. This institutional interest has helped ease the selling pressure observed during the latest market pullbacks.”