The reality, however, is that between paper and the real thing, some prefer the paper. Also, in all fairness, it comes with a few advantages like not having to learn or worry about wallets and backups and whatnot. So, yeah, there are those who prefer the paper.
There are still talks about them Bitcoin ETFs, but not as though they're a new thing. Of course, their volumes rise and fall. I did a quick check on IBIT's volume, BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF. It's still in the billions daily. That remains huge, far from dead.
The volumes are quite decent. Institutions have been mostly buying and occasionally selling bitcoin almost on daily basis.
Another advantage of having ETFs is to not worry about the private keys since we the institutions are holding the custody of their bitcoins.
We can say ETFs have it's own pros and cons and while some prefer the real bitcoins, some others might prefer ETFs which is not that bad at all.
Yeah, it's the same trade-off, just in a different package.
If I remember right, first it was trusting those early online wallets, then it was the new exchanges that swore they were better than Gox. Now it's institutions trusting custodians with their clients' coins. I get why it feels safer...
the names are bigger, they wear suits. But the risk is exactly the same. You're holding an IOU for bitcoin, not the real thing, which took me a while to figure out back in the day.
And those promises have a habit of breaking when things get ugly.
