The fee is a percentage of your balance. When your balance grows, the fee grows. The fee is $1,438 in year 1 and $19,508 in year 20.
Year 1$1,438Fee each yearYear 20$19,508
Casa Premium costs $2,100 each year. This price does not change with your balance. The fund fee is more than this price from year 4.
Part of your bitcoin that pays the fee
4.9%
This is the same at all bitcoin prices.
Total cost of the fee
$399,590
The fees, plus the growth that you lose on them.
Casa Premium in the same years
$42,000
$2,100 each year, for all balances.
“The amount of bitcoin represented by each Share will decrease over the life of the Trust due to the sales of bitcoin necessary to pay the Sponsor’s Fee.”
The IBIT sponsor fee is 0.25% of your balance each year (source: iShares fund page, October 1, 2026). The Casa Premium price is the current list price. This calculator applies the fee 1 time each year. Funds apply it each day. This is an example. It is not investment advice.
The fee of each US spot bitcoin ETF
The table starts with the lowest fee. The cost column uses the example of the calculator, $500,000 for 20 years with 15% growth each year.
A fund sells some of its bitcoin to pay its fee. The fee is a percentage of the value of the fund, so the fee in dollars grows when the price of bitcoin grows. The calculator adds the fee of each year, with the price growth that you select. 15% each year is an example, not a forecast.
Changes to this table
. The table has 14 funds. Each fee comes from the fund's prospectus, filing or fund page, on the date shown.
Fees can change. Check the fund before you rely on a fee.
What you own
We found no US spot bitcoin ETF that lost bitcoin at its custodian. But the structure of a fund has risks.
You own shares, not bitcoin
The IBIT prospectus says “Individual Shares will not be redeemed by the Trust.” Only authorized participants can exchange shares for bitcoin. They are registered broker-dealers, and they exchange 40,000 shares at a time. Before GBTC became an ETF, the price of its shares was as much as 49% less than the value of its bitcoin.
Coinbase is the custodian for most US spot bitcoin funds. IBIT is one of them. Coinbase says that it holds more than 80% of US bitcoin and ether ETF assets.
The IBIT custodian has crime insurance of up to $320 million. All its customers share this insurance. The prospectus says that this amount “may be substantially lower than the assets of the Trust.” The trust and its sponsor do not insure the bitcoin.
A court can decide that the bitcoin is part of the property of a bankrupt custodian. The prospectus says that this can cause “protracted litigation”. It also says that the trust can get back “only a fraction of the Trust’s property.”
Companies that hold bitcoin for customers failed in the past. Some of them were regulated. Prime Trust was a regulated trust company in Nevada. In 2023 it did not pay withdrawals, and it went bankrupt. These are the total losses at exchanges, lenders and custodians.
Total lost, stolen or frozen
$28.5B
US dollars at the time of each incident. Later repayments are not subtracted.
Incidents
154
Thefts, bankruptcies, frauds and stopped withdrawals since 2011.
Bitcoin lost or stolen
1.3M BTC
Only the incidents with a known bitcoin amount.
The 5 largest losses
2022FTXFTX moved customer deposits to its sister company, Alameda. Withdrawals stopped, and FTX filed for bankruptcy 2 days later.$8BFraud
2022Celsius NetworkThe lender stopped all withdrawals. One month later, it filed for bankruptcy. It owed its users $4.7 billion.$4.7BCollapse
2022Genesis (incl. Gemini Earn)Genesis stopped withdrawals after FTX failed. Approximately $900 million that it owed to 340,000 Gemini Earn users was frozen.$3.5BCollapse
2025BybitThis is the largest known crypto theft. The FBI said that North Korea did it. Bybit continued to pay withdrawals and paid for the loss.$1.5BHack
2022Voyager DigitalA borrower did not repay a loan of approximately $650 million. Voyager stopped withdrawals and filed for bankruptcy in the same week.$1.3BCollapse
See all 154 incidents and their sourcesThe amounts are from the time of each incident. Some companies repaid their customers later. The full list shows which companies did.
Questions and answers
Which bitcoin ETF has the lowest fee?
The Morgan Stanley Bitcoin Trust (MSBT), at 0.14% each year. The next lowest are the Grayscale Bitcoin Mini Trust ETF (BTC), at 0.15%, and the Franklin Bitcoin ETF (EZBC), at 0.19%.
Which bitcoin ETF has the highest fee?
The Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF (GBTC), at 1.50% each year. On $500,000 for 20 years, with 15% growth each year, this fee costs $720,998.
Do you own bitcoin when you buy a bitcoin ETF?
No. You own shares of the fund, and a custodian holds the fund's bitcoin. Only authorized participants can exchange shares for bitcoin. They are registered broker-dealers.
Who holds the bitcoin of a bitcoin ETF?
A custodian. 12 of the 14 funds in this table use Coinbase Custody, alone or with other custodians. Coinbase says that it holds more than 80% of US bitcoin and ether ETF assets.
How much does a 0.25% fee cost?
On $500,000, a 0.25% fee costs $142,332 in 20 years, if the price of bitcoin grows 15% each year. The fee grows with the price, so most of the cost comes in the last years.