This year, exchange-traded funds opened several doors to crypto on Wall Street, as the SEC forged a fresh approach to the products. Asset managers had previously fought tooth and nail to offer products tracking Bitcoin and Ethereum’s spot price, but many foresaw opportunities in 2025 as the regulatory environment started to shift with President Donald Trump’s return to power in January. As of Dec. 15, spot Bitcoin ETFs had generated $57.7 billion in net inflows since their historic debut in January 2024, according to Farside Investors. Investors poured $1.2 billion into spot Bitcoin ETFs on Oct. 6, for example, as the asset approached an all-time high above $126,000, according to CoinGlass.
XRP and Solana ETFs have gained traction, with XRP and Solana being the fifth- and seventh-largest assets by market cap, respectively, and facing regulatory headwinds under the Biden administration that dissipated as they became underlying assets for a number of products. Last year’s debut of spot Bitcoin ETFs unleashed a wave of demand that buoyed the asset’s price to new highs, while XRP and Solana have shown notable activity beyond Bitcoin and Ethereum. “I don’t think they’ve had the effect on the price that maybe people hoped for, but idiosyncratically, they have been huge successes and a validation of investor appetite beyond Bitcoin and Ethereum,” Bitwise Senior Investment Strategist Juan Leon told Decrypt. The Solana ETFs were among the first to share a portion of their rewards from staking with investors, a development bolstered by new guidance last month from the U.S. Treasury Department and IRS.
Net inflows for spot Dogecoin ETFs stood at $2 million as of Dec. 15, according to SoSoValue. In 2025, individual investors and hedge funds were among the most likely groups to hold spot crypto ETFs, but that dynamic may start shifting materially soon, according to Gerry O’Shea, head of global market insights at Hashdex Asset Management. Vanguard signaled earlier this month that it would let its 50 million customers trade some spot crypto ETFs on its brokerage platform. Bank of America, meanwhile, put its stamp of approval on modest crypto allocations for private wealth clients starting next year.
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