tl;dr
BlackRock does not buy BTC, OK? Crypto’s economic contribution is probably greater than you might realise.
Market Snap
Market Wrap
$100 for a barrel of oil is not a healthy backdrop for crypto prices.
Curious Cryptos’ NON meme corner
I must keep repeating this, as ignorance really annoys me.
BlackRock does not own any BTC, has never owned any BTC, and will never own any BTC.
Got that?
BlackRock markets spot BTC ETFs to retail and institutional investors. When an investor buys that ETF, they buy it from an AP (authorised participant). The APs are generally the large investment banks.
The AP makes markets in the ETF, buying and selling the ETF. If exposure to BTC reaches a certain level, long or short, it will hedge itself using BTC futures.
If, at the end of the trading day, the AP is short the ETF (because investors have been net buyers), it will square up its hedge and create new ETF shares. In practice, that usually means delivering cash to the trust; the trust then buys BTC via its trading counterparties (often Coinbase Prime) and moves it into cold storage at the custodian. The AP receives new ETF shares from BlackRock and delivers them to end investors.
Alternatively, if, at the end of the trading day, the AP is long the ETF (because investors have been net sellers) it will redeem ETF shares. The AP delivers shares back to the trust; the trust sells a corresponding amount of BTC and returns cash to the AP, which can then unwind its hedge or redeploy the capital as it sees fit.
Note that BlackRock as a firm never goes anywhere near owning or having custody of BTC. The fund underlying the ETF holds BTC at a third-party custodian (probably Coinbase Prime) on behalf of the investors in the ETF.
The APs work very hard to keep their net BTC exposure close to flat, using futures and the creation/redemption process to avoid directional risk. It is the end investor who deliberately takes on BTC price risk via the ETF.
Next time someone tells you that BlackRock is a big buyer of BTC, you can put them right. They won’t like it, for it will demonstrate their ignorance, but what else can a good citizen do.
Curious Cryptos’ Commentary – Politicians should take note
The National Cryptocurrency Association (NCA), partly financed by Ripple Labs, has issued a report addressing the economic contribution of cryptos to the US:
https://www.tbstat.com/wp/uploads/2026/07/FINAL_NCA-Report_-Crypto-at-Work_July-2026-2.pdf
Let’s start with this graphic:
I bet no-one was expecting that outcome. Note this is actual jobs in actual firms. Using a standard model of the “multiplier effect”, the report claims that the crypto industry’s full employment impact is a total of 232,000 jobs, with average pay scales higher than the national median:
A message to all politicians of all stripes – just look at those lovely tax dollars you could access to fritter away on your pet projects. Or, just an idea, use those taxes to reduce the country’s debt burden, which in the case of the UK costs around £100bn to service every year. Surely you must want some of that?
Overall, the report estimates that the crypto industry will contribute $55bn to the US economy in 2026, a number that is heading in one direction only. As the US financial services industry adopts tokenisation across the board, and as the world adopts USD-denominated stablecoins, America is uniquely positioned to be the greatest beneficiary of the crypto revolution.
…
I should point out that it would be difficult to claim that the author of this report, the NCA, is an impartial observer. The report is clearly a lobbying tool, but every other industry does the same.
You can criticise it on several levels. The multiplier effect is a rather blunt tool – estimates of additional jobs created because of the crypto industry could have a very broad range.
Looking at the wage comparison, there is an undoubted sleight of hand going on here. Comparing average wages in the crypto industry with median wages across all other industries flatters the former. I never feel comfortable with statistical fiddling of that nature.
Still, if the report helps just one naysayer to cross into the light, it will have been proved useful.