Will Capital Turn? Biggest Gold ETF Suffers Huge Outflows as BTC Funds Recover

Meanwhile, one popular analyst said that gold is “not a serious competitor to Bitcoin” when it comes to the pace of ETF adoption.

Gold remains the preferred safe-haven asset in a time of exponentially increasing uncertainty, but a significant portion of the investor outflows have been seen in gold, solidified last week by the largest U.S. ETF tracking its performance.

At the same time, BTC-related funds ended the same week in the black, although Thursday and Friday saw significant losses again.

GLD has the biggest capital outflow in recent years

SPDR Gold Trust (GLD) is by far the largest ETF focused on precious metals, with over $174 billion in assets under management as of March. Demonstrating its dominance in the gold market, the second iShares Gold Trust (IAU) has nearly a third ($64 billion) of assets under management.

However, GLD experienced a large withdrawal on Wednesday, with $3 billion flowing out of the fund, according to data shared by Kobeissi Letter. This is “+200% higher than the historical large daily inflows seen over the past two years,” the analyst said.

Meanwhile, the metal’s price fell 4.4% in just one day, its biggest correction since January 30, when it plunged more than 11%.

“This all follows global gold ETFs collecting +$5.3 billion in February and +$18.7 billion in January, marking the ninth consecutive month of inflows and the best two-month start to the year ever,” their post reads.

The analyst concluded that investors booked profits after the metal’s “historic rally.”

Is it incomparable to Bitcoin?

While the gold fund experienced outflows on Wednesday, the Spot Bitcoin ETF recorded net inflows of $461.77 million, its highest day since February 25th. Monday ($458.19 million) and Tuesday ($225.15 million) were also strong, but the week ended on a negative note with net outflows of $227.83 million on Thursday and $348.83 million on Friday.

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Nevertheless, weekly net inflows increased significantly as funds raised a total of $568.45 million. This marks the second straight week of surpluses, after five consecutive weeks of outflows of well over $2 billion.

Although these numbers are significantly lower than those estimated for a single gold-backed fund, they still indicate increasing institutional adoption of BTC. In fact, Crypto Rover posted an interesting graph showing that BTC ETFs have benefited more than gold funds in terms of net inflows over the first few years.

Adoption of Bitcoin ETF and Gold ETF…

Gold is not a serious competitor to Bitcoin. pic.twitter.com/EY1EU2mFIn

— Crypto Rover (@cryptorover) March 7, 2026