Institutional crypto managers are holding a record amount of digital assets, despite a decline in US inflows, CoinShares says

• Total assets under management held by crypto managers have reached a record $57 billion, according to digital asset investment house CoinShares.
• US investors appear less keen on crypto, but European and Canadian appetite remains strong, the report shows.
• Bitcoin trading volume also declined by $387 million last week, it said.

Institutional crypto managers are now managing a record $57 billion in assets, according to digital asset investment firm CoinShares. Last week, net inflows totalled $73 million as minor outflows were offset by incoming investments, a weekly report by the company showed.

Grayscale Investments, the owner of the world's largest bitcoin fund, still manages over three quarters of that record total, with around $44.6 billion, well ahead of CoinShares, which has the second-largest holding, with just shy of $5 billion in assets under management.

The vast majority of inflows in the latest week went into bitcoin, totaling $85 million. Ethereum's ether token and Polkadot were left far behind in second and third place respectively, according to the report. Ether saw inflows of $8 million and Polkadot, $2 million. Volumes traded in bitcoin-based investment products eased back by $387 million to $713 million a day, compared to a daily $1.1 billion for 2021.

"This has not been reflected overall for bitcoin, where trading volumes on trusted exchanges remain at $11.8 billion per day," CoinShares said in its weekly report.

Bitcoin's value has declined in recent weeks and is currently trading around $54,945. It traded at a record above $61,000 earlier in March.

Crypto analysts are increasingly speaking of the potential for a steeper correction in price and some have said indicators are pointing to bitcoin being at a later stage in the bull market.

Other digital assets have followed a similar pattern in the last few months. Following the price highs that a number of digital assets reached in February and their recent volatility, there has been a decline in investor appetite, CoinShares said. However, "there seems to be a regional divide, with declining appetite from the United States and sustained appetite from Europe and Canada," the report added.

The volatility of digital assets is something that does concern banks, regulators and governments. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell stated on Monday that cryptocurrencies are too volatile to replace the dollar and the SEC has not yet approved any bitcoin ETFs, despite the agency's cryptocurrency commissioner stating that this has caused them difficulties.