Data

In crypto, institutional capital and retail capital typically move in waves. A surge of new institutional capital is followed later by a peak in retail trading.

This happens in large part because institutional capital is usually orders of magnitude larger than retail capital, and focused almost exclusively on BTC and ETH. So institutional money flows into BTC and BTC price surges, which stimulates the rest of the crypto market and attracts retail traders. 

This chart shows net inflows to the BlackRock Bitcoin Trust ETF (IBIT), compared to pump.fun trading volume on Solana. The ETF inflows peaked on November 7th, the day after the election. Pump.fun volume peaked a few months later on January 23rd, 2025. 

This suggests that institutional inflows front-ran retail inflows, and had already cooled off by the time retail trading peaked.

First institutional money flows into crypto, then retail

What will happen when the institutional floodgates finally open?