Eastern Standard Time, December 31: The U.S. spot BTC ETF faces renewed pressure on the capital front, with a significant increase in daily net outflows, and prices are under selling pressure amid high-level fluctuations. The ETF subscription and redemption data, along with off-chain capital flows, have weakened, becoming one of the core catalytic signals for this round of correction.

ETF Capital Front: Net Outflows Expand Again

● News Driven:
- From December 30 to 31, multiple U.S. spot BTC ETFs recorded consecutive net outflows, with the total daily net outflow scale expanding significantly compared to the moderate outflows in the latter half of last week.
- The pace of reduction in established fund products has accelerated, contrasting with the previous phase of "slow digestion + slight outflows," indicating an increased willingness for medium to short-term capital to actively withdraw.

● Performance of Subdivided Products:
- GBTC remains the main source of selling pressure, continuing the main tone of "continuous redemptions" since its conversion to an ETF, with the most recent trading day showing continued high net outflows.
- Among other mainstream products, the flagship ETF of leading issuers has shifted from "slight net inflows/nearly flat" to small net outflows, combined with overall market sentiment weakening, leading to a further tilt of total market ETF capital towards the sell side.

● Structural Capital Behavior:
- Institutions show a consensus of "locking in phase profits + reducing risk exposure," especially unwilling to continue raising prices to absorb new chips in the high-level fluctuation range.
- Some short-term quantitative and hedging funds are using ETFs to short/hedge spot positions, increasing passive selling pressure in the market.

Off-Chain Capital and On-Chain Indicators: Risk Appetite Cooling

● Capital Trends:
- The off-chain quotation discount has widened, and the OTC premium of USDT/BTC has contracted, reflecting that small and medium-sized funds have become cautious about future expectations and are no longer actively chasing highs.
- Some market-making and arbitrage positions have reduced cross-market long hedging positions, opting for conservative hedging, which indirectly weakened the buying power on the ETF subscription side.

● On-Chain Behavioral Signals:
- The so-called "whale addresses" have shown significant net selling behavior at recent high prices, with multiple large BTC amounts being passively or actively listed for sale through centralized exchange channels, contributing to short-term additional selling pressure.
- Long-term holders have not shown signs of large-scale concentrated dumping, but short-term profit-taking has chosen to realize gains during the price surge phase, accelerating the turnover of circulating chips at high levels.

● Derivatives and Leverage:
- Leverage long positions in perpetual contracts and options markets have faced continuous deleveraging after the weakening of ETF capital, with forced liquidations and active position reductions compounding, pushing prices down from high levels and amplifying volatility.
- As implied volatility rises, the demand for protective option buying increases, indicating that mid to high-level funds are pricing in systemic correction risks.

Price and Sentiment: A Fragile Balance Amid High-Level Fluctuations

The price adjustment under the deteriorating capital front is not solely caused by a single ETF product or a large redemption, but rather the result of the resonance of multiple forces: ETF net outflows, cooling off-chain risk appetite, profit-taking on-chain, and deleveraging in derivatives. As BTC fluctuates repeatedly in a phase of high levels, marginal incremental buying begins to hesitate, while marginal selling becomes more decisive due to substantial profits. This asymmetric structure places the market in a seemingly "sideways" state, but in reality, it is in a fragile balance that could be amplified at any moment. Once new macro-negative news, regulatory tightening, or global risk asset correlations trigger a correction, the current delicate long-short tension could be quickly broken, evolving into a deeper re-pricing of prices.

Long-Short Divergence: Realizing Benefits or Intermediate Consolidation

● Optimistic/Supportive Side:
- They believe that the current ETF net outflows more reflect the realization of previous massive benefits and chip turnover, representing a common "healthy reshuffling" in the early to mid-stages of a bull market.
- In their view, the ETF's property as a long-term capital entry point remains unchanged; as long as macro liquidity does not experience systemic tightening, there is still hope for orderly entry of slow-variable funds such as pensions and family offices in the medium to long term.
- From an on-chain perspective, long-term holders and institutional cold wallets have not shown concentrated selling, indicating that large funds have not fundamentally shaken the long-term logic of BTC.

● Pessimistic/Opposing Side:
- They worry that the high-level net outflows of ETF funds signal that the "incremental story has peaked," and the momentum for new buying is unlikely to replicate the explosive scale of the early listing phase.
- As the price remains at high levels for an extended period, the market's reliance on the next round of driving narratives (such as new rounds of easing expectations or regulatory benefits) deepens; if expectations fall short, it could trigger a resonant correction.
- Cooling off-chain sentiment, declining leverage ratios, and high-level reductions by whales are seen by pessimists as the foundational puzzle pieces for "top construction," rather than merely a technical consolidation.

Market Outlook: Focus on Capital, Not Price

In the short term, the market will focus on the changes in the subscription and redemption scale of the BTC spot ETF in the coming days, whether the off-chain OTC premium further contracts, and whether large on-chain addresses continue to transfer chips to exchanges. If the scale of ETF net outflows shows marginal narrowing, or even returns to a small net inflow range, while off-chain discounts repair and derivatives leverage stabilizes, this round of adjustment is likely to be validated as a phase reshuffling; conversely, if net outflows continue to expand, whale concentrated reductions increase, and macro risk assets face pressure simultaneously, caution is warranted for BTC to enter a more complete downward cycle from high levels. In this phase of capital competition, tracking the direction of capital and structural chip migration is more critical than monitoring price fluctuations.

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