Original｜Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)
Author｜Wenser (@wenser 2010 )
Recently, Amundi, Europe's largest asset management company with assets under management of $2.9 trillion, disclosed that it increased its stake in Strategy by 148%, currently holding 1.32 million shares worth $127.7 million. Looking back at recent data, despite BTC's constant fluctuations and the lackluster performance of crypto concept stocks, many institutions still chose to increase their holdings against the trend, waiting for market rebound profits.
Now, claims about "DAT model bankruptcy" and "collapse of institutional crypto faith" are rampant, but the 13F filings that the U.S. SEC mandates quarterly reveal the truth of the time lag—a group of investment institutions with assets under management often in the hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars are quietly increasing their positions at their own pace. Odaily Planet Daily will briefly review the relevant targets and some representative investment institutions in this article.
Strategy (MSTR): Asset management giants and public funds add positions
MSTR is the stock with the most solid data in this round of institutional increases, with buyers covering asset management companies, large banks, public funds, and other institutions.
The Amundi position of approximately 1.32 million shares mentioned at the beginning of the article is not the result of continuous one-way buying. In Q1 of this year, it cut its Strategy stock position by nearly 90%, and the Q2 increase was a replenishment on a low base of about 530,000 shares. After all, the crypto market's Q1 performance was almost desperate, and asset management giants also need to assess the situation and trade accordingly.
Asset management giant Vanguard's VOE fund previously announced on July 20 that it increased its holdings of MSTR stock by 83,093 shares, worth $8.16 million, bringing its position to 2.12 million shares, worth $209 million; on July 27, its VTSAX fund increased its holdings of MSTR stock by 529,100 shares, worth $50 million, bringing its position to 10.5 million shares, worth $994 million.
The world's fourth-largest asset management company, State Street Corporation, recently disclosed an increase of 506,635 shares of MSTR stock, involving approximately $51 million, with total holdings reaching 7.52 million shares, worth approximately $758 million, an increase of 7.2% in position size.
Capital Group, the world's largest active fund management company with assets under management of $3.3 trillion, disclosed in July that its Growth ETF (CGGR) increased its MSTR holdings by 80,240 shares, worth $7.78 million, bringing its position to 1.66 million shares, worth $161.39 million.
The Netherlands' fifth-largest asset management company, Robeco, disclosed in July that its MSTR position increased by 11%, with total holdings reaching 133,755 shares, worth $13.1 million.
Korean asset management companies are also one of the main forces increasing MSTR holdings. Mirae Asset Global Investments, South Korea's second-largest asset management company with assets under management of $845 billion, disclosed in July an increase of 25,573 MSTR shares, worth $2.42 million, bringing its position to 135,951 shares, worth $12.87 million.
In addition to asset management institutions, increases by banks and public funds are also worth noting.
In terms of large banks, Sweden's second-largest bank, Svenska Handelsbanken AB, with assets of $132.5 billion, previously increased its MSTR holdings by 23,829 shares, worth $2.21 million, with total holdings reaching 106,522 shares, worth $9.92 million; Sweden's third-largest bank, Swedbank AB, previously increased its Strategy stock holdings by 8,278 shares, with total holdings reaching 90,590 shares, worth $8.81 million; Bank of New York Mellon recently disclosed an increase of 14,630 Strategy shares, worth $1.45 million, bringing total holdings to 1.02 million shares, worth $102.4 million; National Bank of Canada increased its MSTR holdings to 1.2 million shares, nearly doubling, with a position value of $116 million; Citibank increased its holdings by 238,538 shares, with a position value of $90.5 million; European banks such as Nordea, the Nordic banking giant, and Raiffeisen Bank International, the Austrian banking giant, also increased their MSTR stock holdings by amounts ranging from hundreds of thousands to over a million dollars.
In terms of public funds, the Michigan retirement system, with assets under management exceeding $100 billion, recently disclosed that its MSTR position increased from approximately 5,800 shares to 14,000 shares, an increase of 141%, with a market value of approximately $1.22 million; the Louisiana State Employees Retirement System increased its MSTR stock holdings to 21,300 shares, worth $2.13 million; the New Jersey Police and Firemen's Retirement System's MSTR position recently increased to 49,055 shares, worth $4.66 million.
Although the absolute amounts of the above increased positions are not large, the fact that these public pension funds, which prioritize fiduciary responsibility, are willing to expand their risk exposure to BTC assets is more significant as a signal than the funds themselves.
Bitmine (BMNR): From hedge funds to asset management giants buying
As the leading stock in the Ethereum treasury sector, BMNR's market performance has not been satisfactory.
After attracting Citadel Advisors and Susquehanna International, two quantitative funds, to invest over $100 million in increased holdings in Q1, the main force of increases in Q2 gradually shifted to mainstream asset management giants and index funds.
BlackRock is currently the largest institutional shareholder of BMNR, holding 27.2971 million shares as of the end of June this year;
State Street Corp. held 8.74 million BMNR shares at the end of Q2, strongly entering the top 10 shareholders;
Cathie Wood's Ark Invest held 5.7 million shares at the end of Q2, but at the end of July it sold approximately 121,000 Bitmine shares, worth $2 million.
The most noteworthy thing in Q2 is that Bitmine entered the Russell Index, which triggered mandatory large-scale buying by passive index funds and ETFs under many giants. At present, it is difficult to regard this as "asset management giants making buying operations after active judgment."
Circle (CRCL): Public funds, asset management giants, international banks, and Cathie Wood are all making moves
On the CRCL front, both types of funds have taken action.
CalPERS, the California Public Employees' Retirement System, established a new position in Circle in Q2, buying a total of 139,507 shares, investing approximately $13.31 million, at the tens of millions of dollars level, conservative in direction but clear in attitude.
In Q1, many funds were also positioning. According to data disclosed in the latest quarter: Southpoint Capital Advisors previously increased its stake by 175%, approximately 2.1 million shares, with a market value of about $200 million; Jane Street increased its holdings by more than ten times, approximately 1.94 million shares, with a market value of about $185 million; Morgan Stanley increased its holdings by 241%, approximately 3.52 million shares, with a market value of about $336 million.
Entering Q2, despite the slow progress of the CLARITY Act, more institutions chose to buy into Circle's "crypto banking and payment giant narrative."
Norway's sovereign wealth fund spent $131.8 million to buy 2,105,378 shares;
Swiss National Bank holds approximately 418,900 shares, valued at about $26.23 million;
Korea Investment Corporation also bought 65,443 shares, valued at about $4.1 million;
BlackRock even directly increased its stake by 65.35%, raising its total position to 8.4 million shares.
ARK Invest has also been active in this asset, with its latest transaction being the purchase of 313,764 shares of Circle stock through its ARKK fund on August 7, valued at approximately $20.92 million based on a price of $66.67 per share. According to previous data, as of July 31, ARK Innovation ETF held 3.82% of Circle stock among its top ten holdings, ranking 8th.
Coinbase (COIN): Vanguard passively buys, Ark Invest buys on dips and trades tactically
COIN's largest institutional shareholder is Vanguard, with a position that has remained in the tens of millions of shares and a market value of billions of dollars for years. The source of such positions is clear: COIN has been included in mainstream indices such as the S&P 500, and Vanguard's index funds and ETFs passively buy according to weight, with the size following the free-float market cap, not reflecting active fund manager decisions to "add now."
BlackRock and State Street have consistently been among the top shareholders of COIN, with logic similar to Vanguard. What truly carries active judgment is the sector rotation within thematic funds like ARK, rather than new purchases by traditional large asset managers.
ARK Invest's choice is to buy COIN on dips and occasionally trade tactically. Its latest transaction occurred on August 7, spending approximately $9.16 million to buy 59,668 shares of Coinbase stock at $153.6 per share. As of July 31, ARK Innovation ETF held 4.54% of Coinbase stock among its top ten holdings, ranking 5th.
Robinhood (HOOD): Pension funds add in small increments, institutional ownership exceeds 90%
HOOD's institutional ownership ratio has exceeded 93%, making it the most institutionalized among these assets.
Q1 13F data this year shows that Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund increased its stake by 19.3%, raising its position to 74,000 shares, valued at approximately $5.14 million; Empowered Funds increased by 46.7%, holding about 50,000 shares. These individual amounts are not large, but what is more telling is the breadth—many small and mid-sized pension funds and bank-affiliated asset managers are simultaneously adding small positions, indicating that HOOD has entered the regular allocation pool of such conservative capital, rather than being an alternative asset requiring special approval.
ARK also added approximately 1.19 million shares of HOOD in Q1. According to reliable data, as of July 31, ARK Innovation ETF also held 3.54% of Robinhood stock among its top ten holdings, ranking 9th.
Block (XYZ): BlackRock slightly reduced in Q2, Cathie Wood builds position tactically
Regarding Block stock, the most noteworthy is BlackRock's Q2 action—according to the latest disclosure, BlackRock holds approximately 41,573,031 shares of Block stock, valued at about $3.1596 billion; compared to Q1, it actually slightly reduced its Block holdings by 665,843 shares.
Cathie Wood, on the other hand, shows a distinctive tendency toward this stock: mid-July trading records show ARK bought approximately 72,000 shares of Block stock, valued at about $5.63 million; on August 6, Ark Invest again disclosed buying 267,676 shares of Block stock, valued at about $21 million. It is worth noting that Ark Invest will appropriately reduce positions during market declines, operating flexibly.
Bullish (BLSH): Cathie Wood leads, asset managers follow
BLSH has been listed for a short time, with institutional positions mostly concentrated in the last two quarters.
Cathie Wood's ARK Invest is one of the earliest and most decisive buyers, with Q1 position building exceeding $160 million.
Massachusetts Financial Services (MFS) and Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank have also each built new positions of nearly $100 million, in line with ARK's direction.
There are not many options in the sector; just pick the leaders
Based on the above information, most investment institutions, for risk management, stable returns, and passive holding requirements of funds, have mostly adopted an investment strategy of "leading stocks + a few optional choices."
The patterns that can be summarized are:
- Genuine active-judgment additions are concentrated in thematic funds like ARK and some hedge funds; they adjust positions frequently, have clear directions, and are willing to keep buying during declines.
- Index fund giants like Vanguard, BlackRock, and State Street appear in almost every shareholder list, but they are more passively buying according to index weights, and should not be simply interpreted as "institutions bullish."
- Although pension funds' actions are small in individual amounts, their coverage is expanding. Michigan, Illinois, and California public funds have almost simultaneously appeared on the list of crypto stock additions, indicating that crypto assets are being accepted as allocable assets by more institutions with extremely low risk appetite and conservative investment styles.
For retail investors, 13F filings have a 45-day disclosure delay, and institutional position adjustments are extremely flexible and changeable. Previous holdings information can only serve as investment reference and cannot be directly "copied" for trading, especially for someone like Cathie Wood who acts opportunistically and trades frequently.
What is more worth pondering is the signal conveyed by the combined movements of various institutional funds—in terms of judging market bottoms and sector options, institutions are more solid and astute than retail investors. (If there are any errors or omissions in specific data, or if there is a more detailed version, readers are welcome to provide feedback.)
