Bitcoin price has outperformed traditional assets like stocks and commodities this year despite the recent drawdown. It has risen by over 30% this year while the Nasdaq 100 and S&P 500 indices have risen by less than 21%.
The 2x Bitcoin Strategy ETF (BITX) has also done well as it rallied by 26% this year, bringing its assets to over $1.4 billion. So, is the BITX ETF a good asset to invest in?
What is the 2x Bitcoin Strategy ETF?
Leveraged ETFs like the ProShares UltraPro QQQ ETF (TQQQ) and the Direxion Daily Semiconductor Bull 3x Shares ETF (SOXL) have become highly popular among risk-taking investors.
The 2x Bitcoin Strategy ETF is a fund that aims to provide robust returns to Bitcoin investors. Its goal is to deliver daily returns that are two times the performance of the S&P CME Bitcoin Futures Daily Roll Index.
This is a popular index that tracks the performance of Bitcoin futures. It then adjusts its holdings each day to maintain a daily 2x exposure.
Ideally, the BITX ETF rises by 2% if the price of Bitcoin futures rise by 1%. Historically, these futures have done well in tracking the spot Bitcoin price.
While the fund tracks the daily performance of Bitcoin futures, it does well when the coin is doing well in the long term. The same concept explains why the TQQQ and SOXL ETFs have done well over the years.
Opportunities and risks for the BITX ETF
The BITX ETF’s price action has not done well in the past few weeks as Bitcoin has moved into a deep bear market.
This performance is happening at a time when the German government has continued to dump coins in the market. Its goal is to liquidate the 50,000 coins it seized from a defunct pirating website into cash.
Mt.Gox has also continued to liquidate its coins while the Bitcoin miner capitulation is continuing. All this is happening in the summer season when activity in the Bitcoin market tends to be muted.
Therefore, there is a likelihood that the coin will remain under pressure in the coming weeks, unless a major catalyst happens. Worse, Bitcoin has formed a double-top chart pattern pointing to more downside.
However, in the long term, there is a likelihood that Bitcoin price will thrive as it has done in the past decade. Such a move will be beneficial to the 2x Bitcoin Strategy ETF, which is expected to beat Bitcoin.
Is the BITX ETF a good fund?
The BITX ETF faces numerous risks that investors should be aware of. First, it is a highly expensive fund that has an expense ratio of 1.90%. In contrast, the iShares Bitcoin ETF (IBIT) has an expense ratio of 0.25%.
A 1.90% expense ratio means that $10,000 in the fund will cost $190 in the first year, a huge sum. If it remains steady for a decade, it will cost the investor $1,900.
BITX ETF vs Bitcoin
Second, the BITX ETF has underperformed Bitcoin since its inception in 2023. As shown above, the Bitcoin has risen by 89.4% in the past 12 months while the BITX fund has jumped by 86.30% in the same period.
The same has happened this year as Bitcoin has risen by 29.86% while the BITX fund has risen by 26%. Therefore, for a highly expensive fund, one would expect a superior performance, which is not the case.
Third, the fund will always have some huge drawdowns because the crypto industry is highly cyclical. In the past 15 years, Bitcoin has had some huge rallies and drawdowns. For example, it dropped from over $28,000 in 2021 to $15,800 in 2022. In such a scenario, the BITX will have a deeper drawdown.
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