What happened
Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, told Crypto Briefing in a piece published Saturday that spot Bitcoin ETFs are likely to mirror the trajectory of gold ETFs, and could carry three times the assets under management of the gold complex within three to five years. Balchunas grounded the comparison in the SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) launch in 2004 and the roughly two decades of flows, drawdowns, and rebuilds that followed.
He argued the Bitcoin ETF cohort is compressing a similar cycle into a much shorter window, using gold's own history as a benchmark rather than a bullish talking point. The comment was made in the context of investor questions about whether Bitcoin ETF demand is slowing after the initial 2024 rush.
Why it matters
The Bitcoin ETF category is now the frame through which most non-crypto-native capital sizes exposure. Every framing an ETF strategist puts on the flow picture matters for how RIAs, wealth platforms, and pensions calibrate allocation. Balchunas has been the go-to voice for that community since GLD's early years, so a public call that Bitcoin ETFs will overshoot gold's roughly $130B-plus AUM is a nudge for advisors still treating the category as speculative.
It also reframes the recent stretch of choppy flows. If gold's 22-year record includes multi-year stretches of flat or negative flows before the next leg, the current Bitcoin ETF chop is a feature of the analog, not a broken thesis.
Market impact
The immediate market impact is narrative, not price. Balchunas isn't putting a target on Bitcoin. He's putting a target on the category's assets, which is what allocators actually track.
The base case here is straightforward: if U. S. spot Bitcoin ETFs need to triple gold ETF AUM in three to five years, weekly net inflows have to reaccelerate from their recent pace, and IBIT would likely have to keep pulling share from both GBTC and gold.