U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs continued their strong run on May 12, drawing approximately $220 million in net inflows, according to institutional flow data. The daily haul pushed cumulative monthly net additions close to $1 billion, extending a robust first half of May for regulated crypto investment products. BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) once again led the market, contributing heavily to the month’s total of over $2.4 billion in spot Bitcoin ETF inflows.
Bitcoin traded near the $80,000–$81,000 range during the session, as investors balanced steady institutional demand against macroeconomic uncertainty from hotter-than-expected U.S. inflation figures. Despite risk-off sentiment across equities and crypto-linked stocks, the ETF inflows remained resilient, suggesting long-term allocators are accumulating Bitcoin exposure through these vehicles. Analysts pointed to the growing role of daily ETF flows in short-term market liquidity and price formation, especially amid Treasury market volatility.
While Bitcoin ETFs flourished, Ethereum-linked products continued to lag. Several reports noted mixed flows and weaker momentum even after Ethereum’s recent Pectra upgrade, with Bitcoin firmly dominating institutional allocations as a macro asset and digital store of value.
Separately, a curious pattern has emerged between Bitcoin and the Roundhill Sports Betting & iGaming ETF (BETZ), listed on the NYSE. Since its launch in June 2020, BETZ has exhibited a remarkably tight correlation with Bitcoin’s price cycles—a 90-day correlation coefficient of 0.73 and a 365-day figure of 0.91. More striking, the fund has consistently hit major peaks and troughs several weeks before Bitcoin’s own trend reversals. BETZ peaked in September 2021, two months before BTC; its bottom in September 2022 preceded Bitcoin’s by three months; and it topped again in August 2025, two months ahead of Bitcoin’s peak. While far from definitive causation, the timing offsets across multiple cycles have drawn attention as a potential sentiment and liquidity proxy, reinforcing the view of Bitcoin as a risk-sensitive macro asset. Traders note that BETZ’s recent decoupling from rising BTC prices may be an early signal worth monitoring, though the historical relationship is no guarantee of future patterns.
