In the long history of investment, gold has always been regarded as the unshakeable "king of safe havens." However, everything changed starting in 2024. On January 10, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) officially approved 11 spot Bitcoin ETFs, including those from BlackRock and Fidelity, marking the beginning of an unprecedented capital migration. Funds began to seek a vehicle that was more explosive and better suited to the digital age than gold. Looking back now in 2025, the winner of this migration is undisputed: BlackRock's IBIT. It has accomplished in less than two years what took Gold ETFs (GLD) over a decade. According to the latest Q3 financial reports, from academic institutions like Harvard University to Middle Eastern royalty, the world's top capital is rapidly shifting its portfolio from "old gold" to "new gold." From "Birth" to "Trillion-Dollar Giant" First, we need to understand the destination of this migration—what exactly is IBIT? IBIT (iShares Bitcoin Trust) is a Bitcoin spot ETF launched by BlackRock, the world's largest asset management company. Its emergence solves the biggest pain points of traditional funds: compliance and convenience. Through IBIT, investors do not need to register with complex cryptocurrency exchanges, nor do they need to worry about losing their private keys. You can hold BlackRock's 1:1 custodial Bitcoin assets on Nasdaq just like buying and selling stocks. It is this "securitization" bridge that has allowed IBIT to achieve a speed that gold can only dream of: The $100 Billion Milestone: BlackRock CEO Larry Fink recently announced that IBIT's assets under management have officially surpassed $100 billion. Speed Comparison: It took GLD over a decade to reach this scale, while IBIT achieved it in less than two years. It is precisely the establishment of this "compliance bridge" that has finally given the massive amounts of traditional capital that have long coveted digital assets a ticket to enter the market. The Choice Between Harvard and the Royal Family If retail investors' buying is an emotional outburst, then the buying by top institutions is a well-thought-out strategy. The 13F filings disclosed in Q3 2025 reveal a shocking portfolio of holdings.
1. Harvard University: Gold Still Exists, But "New Darlings" Grow Faster
Harvard University's endowment fund has always been known for its stability. Data shows that as of September 30, Harvard held both GLD and IBIT.
- GLD Holdings: valued at $235 million, a 98% increase month-over-month.
- IBIT Holdings: valued at $443 million, a staggering 257% increase month-over-month. A noteworthy detail is that Harvard's holdings in IBIT are now four times the value of its Nvidia stock holdings ($109 million). This indicates that in the eyes of academic capital, Bitcoin is no longer a marginal asset, but a more core asset allocation than popular tech stocks. 2. Middle Eastern Royal Families: Viewing BTC as a "Store of Value" The Abu Dhabi Investment Committee (ADIC) increased its IBIT holdings to nearly 8 million units in the third quarter, worth approximately $518 million, a threefold increase from the previous quarter. The logic behind this move is even more ambitious. ADIC explicitly stated that it views Bitcoin as a store of value similar to gold. For sovereign wealth funds seeking intergenerational wealth transfer, this is not just an investment, but also a hedge against the future monetary system. Meanwhile, the Avenir Group has increased its holdings for five consecutive quarters, currently holding nearly $1.2 billion worth of IBIT, firmly maintaining its position as the largest institutional holder in Asia. The collective action of these top institutions proves that the crypto industry is no longer synonymous with "speculation," but rather the focus of global capital. IBIT is the best illustration of this global consensus during this period. A Milestone in Market Structure Beyond the explosive growth in size and open interest, the market structure itself has undergone a crucial upgrade. For a long time, the Bitcoin derivatives market was dominated by Deribit (a platform primarily for crypto-native users and traders). However, last week, BlackRock IBIT's open interest in options ($38 billion) officially surpassed Deribit's ($32 billion). This milestone directly demonstrates that traditional financial institutions and large professional investors are rapidly and massively entering the Bitcoin market through regulated tools. This deep integration means that Bitcoin assets have gained unprecedented liquidity, significantly enhancing market maturity and transparency.
Beyond Gold
IBIT achieved a scale that gold ETFs couldn't reach in over a decade in less than two years, but this is only the surface. Its surpassing of GLD ultimately lies in IBIT's structural advantages over traditional safe-haven assets:
- Return Advantage: While the annualized returns of traditional safe-haven assets like GLD typically stabilize in the single digits, Bloomberg analysts point out that even after price corrections, IBIT's annualized return since its listing in 2024 has remained close to 80%. This proves that IBIT possesses both the **allocation potential of a safe-haven asset** and the **explosive growth potential of a growth asset**. **Capital Resilience:** Traditional gold ETFs often face capital outflows when prices fall. However, as data from SoSoValue shows, even during periods of price volatility, IBIT still records a net inflow of $224 million per day. This resilience of "buying more as prices fall" is precisely a sign that global institutions regard IBIT as a **long-term strategic allocation**. **On January 10, 2024, the SEC's approval toppled the first domino; in 2025, IBIT, with its $100 billion scale, proved the irreversibility of this wealth migration. Gold remains the steady ballast, but in 2025, Bitcoin is becoming the nuclear-powered speedboat. A new era of digital assets, driven by global top-tier capital consensus, has officially begun.
XingChi
Xu Lin
ZeZheng
Bernice
Joy
Brian
Cointelegraph