Bitcoin ETFs bleed $636 million in a day, the worst outflow since June, as bitcoin slips to about $81,500

Wall Street's bitcoin funds just had their worst day in four months. US spot bitcoin ETFs recorded $635.6 million of net outflows on Thursday, October 22, 2026, the biggest one-day withdrawal since June, according to data compiled by The Block and matched by Farside Investors. The exit erased Wednesday's inflow of about $528 million.

BlackRock's IBIT shed $254.1 million, Fidelity's FBTC $217.5 million and ARKB $109.4 million, with Bitwise's BITB and Grayscale's GBTC also losing money; only Morgan Stanley's MSBT added a small $2.3 million, The Block reported. Spot ether ETFs lost $110.6 million the same day.

The week is still positive at $442.7 million, per The Block, but Cointelegraph, citing SoSoValue, said the outflow pushed October's running total to a net minus $175 million.

The selling tracked a stock rout: the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.6% on Thursday, its worst session since June, and the S&P 500 lost 1.2%, The Block noted. Bitcoin dipped below $81,000 overnight before recovering toward $82,000 in Asian hours, per CoinDesk, and was near $81,500, down about 3.4% in a day, The Block reported on Friday morning (published 7:39am ET). At least $440 million of leveraged crypto positions were liquidated in 24 hours, most of them longs, per CoinGlass data cited by The Block.

Before Thursday's reversal, Lorris Beziers, senior DeFi analyst at Tesseract Group, told The Block the test was whether inflows continued while bitcoin held $80,000 to $81,000: "If inflows fade and that floor breaks, the demand picture has weakened." Friday's flow figures are the next thing to watch.