BlackRock Dominates with $260M Bitcoin & Ether ETF Haul as Wall Stampedes Into Crypto

Wall Street's old guard finally cashes in on the digital gold rush—and the take is staggering.

The ETF Gold Rush

BlackRock just vacuumed up a quarter-billion dollars from its new crypto offerings. The world's largest asset manager proves even traditional finance giants can't ignore the siren call of blockchain profits. Their Bitcoin and Ether ETFs attracted institutional money like moths to a flame.

Main Street Follows Wall Street

Where BlackRock leads, capital follows. The $260 million influx signals a watershed moment for cryptocurrency adoption. Pension funds and retirement accounts now have a regulated on-ramp to digital assets—bypassing the technical hurdles that kept them sidelined for years.

Finance's Ironic Embrace

The same institutions that dismissed Bitcoin as a bubble now scramble for their slice of the crypto pie. They'll probably still charge 2% management fees for the privilege of holding your decentralized assets. Some things never change.

The floodgates are officially open—and the tide's only getting higher.

For comparison, many fintech startups spend a decade trying to reach that kind of revenue.

The success shows that crypto ETFs are no longer just a test run but a major source of income for the world’s largest asset manager.

Waidmann added that every pension fund, sovereign wealth fund, and insurance company will now use BlackRock as a benchmark.

If the asset manager can extract $260 million annually from bitcoin and Ethereum, Wall Street institutions around the globe are now forced to take crypto seriously, not as “future tech,” but as a business opportunity they’re already late to.

BlackRock’s Bitcoin and Ether ETFs Inspire Wall Street Crypto Custody

According to on-chain data from Arkham Intelligence, BlackRock is now the largest institutional custodian of Bitcoin and Ethereum.

The firm holds over 756,000 BTC, valued at $85.29 billion, and 3.802 million Ether (ETH), valued at $15.89 billion.

With other crypto assets, such as the SPX and MOG tokens, in its portfolio, the asset manager has custody of over $101 billion worth of crypto assets.

BlackRock is known for making large Bitcoin and ETH purchases, especially during market downturns.

Data from Farside Investors shows that BlackRock’s ETH-linked fund alone saw $512 million in net capital inflows last week.

According to BlackRock’s latest report, the firm recorded $14.1 billion in digital asset net inflows for the second quarter of 2025.

Although digital assets still represent just 1% of BlackRock’s $12.5 trillion in total assets under management (AUM), the crypto category is emerging as one of its fastest-growing product lines.

Crypto ETFs generated $40 million in base fees and securities lending revenue in Q2 2025.

CEO Larry Fink attributed some of the firm’s momentum to digital assets.

“We’re attracting a new and increasingly global generation of investors through things like our digital assets offerings,” he said.

BlackRock Bringing Wall Street On-Chain

BlackRock has also been working on bringing Wall Street on-chain. According to a Bloomberg report, the New York-based firm is working on tokenizing exchange-traded funds (ETFs) tied to real-world assets such as stocks, subject to regulatory considerations.

@BlackRock is looking into the tokenization of ETFs, following the firm's launch of its BUIDL fund and spot Bitcoin ETFs.#Tokenization #BlackRock #ETFshttps://t.co/mBm4mL1fTn

The MOVE follows BlackRock’s earlier ventures into digital assets.

In 2024, the company launched its tokenized money-market fund BUIDL, which has grown to more than $2 billion in assets and has gained traction across crypto platforms.

Aside from crypto ETFs, BlackRock has also been championing real-world asset (RWA) tokenization.

Recently, Ripple partnered with Securitize, a real-world asset firm, to launch a smart contract allowing holders of BlackRock’s BUIDL and VanEck’s VBILL tokenized treasury funds to exchange their shares for Ripple USD (RLUSD).

Alessio Quaglini, CEO of Hong Kong-based Hex Trust, believes regulation is the last hurdle to full institutional participation in crypto.

“Give it a few months, every single bank in the U.S. will provide custody services for Bitcoin,” Quaglini said in a recent interview. “That’s when we’ll have real adoption, when banks start offering Bitcoin deposits, trading, and structured products.”

His view adds to the growing belief that once U.S. regulators finalize rules, the banking sector will follow swiftly.

While banks worldwide have run pilots, few have gone live without clear U.S. approval.