Last week, the cryptocurrency market experienced one of its most dramatic shake-ups of the year. Despite the chaos, crypto exchange-traded products (ETPs) saw an impressive $3.17 billion in net inflows over the week. This indicates that institutional investors, who comprise a growing portion of the crypto market, are no longer easily spooked by short-term volatility.
An article from CoinShares reveals that Bitcoin (BTC) was the main driver of these inflows. The world’s largest digital asset accounted for $2.67 billion, cementing its role as the go-to “safe haven”. Institutional investors often fall back on Bitcoin in volatile periods, seeing it as the most established and liquid crypto asset.
With these latest inflows, Bitcoin’s year-to-date total has now climbed to $30.2 billion. While that’s still below the $41.7 billion seen in 2024, the number remains impressive.
In total, crypto investment funds have now attracted a record $48.7 billion in inflows in 2025, surpassing last year’s total and underscoring the growing trust in digital assets.
Trading activity also spiked to new heights. Weekly volumes in crypto ETPs soared to $53 billion, more than double the 2025 average. Friday’s session was particularly intense, with $15.3 billion in trading volume, marking the highest single-day correction volume on record at $10.4 billion.
What’s even more telling is that, despite the panic selling, inflows didn’t flip negative. Net inflows on Friday alone stood at $0.39 million.
The sudden market crash was set off by an announcement from President Donald Trump, who revealed plans to raise tariffs on all Chinese imports to 100% and introduce strict export controls on “any and all critical software.” This came as a direct response to China’s newly imposed export restrictions on rare earth minerals vital for technology and manufacturing industries.
In a further escalation, China tightened its grip on rare earth exports earlier in the week and announced that starting October 14, U.S. vessels would face additional port fees.
The news sent many risk assets into a tailspin. In crypto, that translated into over $20 billion in liquidations within hours, with many positions forcibly closed as margin calls cascaded. Despite that, the funds maintained surprising stability: only about $159 million in outflows were recorded on Friday.
“Despite the hype around the upcoming SOL and XRP US ETF launches, inflows have slowed to US$93.3m and US$61.6m respectively,” CoinShares added.
Several major asset managers, including Bitwise, 21Shares, Canary, VanEck, and Franklin Templeton, have already filed for spot Solana (SOL) ETFs, but the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has been slow to make a final call. Ripple (XRP) is following a similar path, with filings coming from Grayscale, Wisdom Tree, Franklin Templeton, and other players.
The recent rule changes have helped smooth the filing process by allowing issuers to use S-1 forms instead of older, more cumbersome submission types. That’s good news, but the momentum has been tempered by delays caused by the U.S. government shutdown, which has slowed SEC reviews and decisions.
After a steep weekend that brought BTC close to $100,000, the flagship cryptocurrency is staging a modest recovery. Bitcoin is trading around $115,267, up 3.4% in the last 24 hours, although it is still down approximately 8.1% over the past week.


