BlackRock says 75% of IBIT investors had never owned an ETF, highlighting growing convergence between crypto and traditional finance.
Bitcoin News
BlackRock's spot Bitcoin exchange traded fund has become an entry point for investors who had never owned an ETF before, according to Jay Jacobs, the firm's US head of equity ETFs. He shared the data on Cointelegraph's Chain Reaction podcast on June 18, 2026.
Jacobs said roughly three-quarters of investors in the iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT) had no prior ETF exposure. "IBIT was a way for traditional investors to now get into digital assets, but we have seen a lot of people really kind of enter into IBIT, starting with digital asset ETPs," he said.
IBIT launched in January 2024 and remains BlackRock's flagship crypto product. The fund holds $48 billion in assets under management and 765,936 BTC.
"We absolutely see it as this is a way to engage with a different group of people than maybe we've engaged with in the past," Jacobs said. He noted that investors who gain exposure through IBIT often go on to buy other BlackRock funds, including the S&P 500 fund IVV, the artificial intelligence fund BAI, and the gold fund IAU.
BlackRock Calls Trend the Great Convergence
Jacobs described the overlap between traditional finance and decentralized finance as the "Great Convergence." He said assets historically held separately, such as DeFi versus TradFi and private versus publicly listed assets, are now being combined as investors seek more complete portfolio solutions.
"I think you're gonna hear a lot less about versus, you know, TradFi versus DeFi, and I think you're gonna see a lot more ampersands, it's TradFi and DeFi," he said.
BlackRock launched the iShares Bitcoin Premium Income ETF (BITA) on June 16, 2026. The fund seeks to generate income by writing covered call options on IBIT shares.
Related Article: BlackRock Bitcoin Yield ETF Targets July Launch
Pre-IPO Trading Volume Surges to $22 Billion
A recent example of the convergence played out during the SpaceX IPO earlier in June 2026, when crypto traders accessed exposure to the private company through pre-IPO perpetual futures and tokenized stocks. Pre-IPO perps let investors trade exposure to private companies before a formal listing.
Exchanges including Binance, Coinbase, Hyperliquid and Kraken now offer pre-IPO perps. Trading volume in this market rose from about $1 billion in early May to roughly $22 billion, with Binance as the largest venue by volume, according to CryptoQuant.
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