Harvard Fund Slashes Bitcoin and Ether ETF Stakes as Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Adds Exposure

US spot bitcoin ETFs, approved in 2024, gave university endowments and sovereign wealth funds a regulated route to bitcoin exposure without holding the token directly. Positions held by Harvard Management Company, which oversees Harvard University's endowment, and Abu Dhabi investors Mubadala Investment Company and the Abu Dhabi Investment Council are closely watched as signals of how large, long-horizon institutions are treating digital assets.

Form 13F filings released Aug. 14 showed Harvard Management Company held its 3,044,612 shares of BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust, or IBIT, unchanged as of June 30, 2026. The stake was worth about $101.4 million at quarter-end, after Harvard cut the position 43% in the first quarter. Mubadala and the Abu Dhabi Investment Council also stood pat, retaining a combined 22,940,629 IBIT shares valued at roughly $763.7 million.

Intesa Sanpaolo, Italy’s largest banking group, has emerged as a closely watched institutional participant in digital assets. Its US-listed exchange-traded fund positions offer a window into how traditional lenders are managing crypto exposure through regulated products. The latest portfolio shift suggests the bank is not retreating from the asset class, but reallocating between Bitcoin and Ether as it reassesses risk and return.

In a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Intesa Sanpaolo disclosed that its holding in an iShares staked Ether ETF rose to $7.1 million as of June 30, roughly triple the previous quarter’s level. At the same time, the bank cut its shares in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF, known by the ticker IBIT, by nearly 94% during the second quarter.

U.S. university endowments rely on equities, bonds and private assets to fund their institutions, but high stock valuations, tight credit spreads and crowded private markets are squeezing expected returns. The W.K. Kellogg Foundation has said the model requires an 8% return to remain viable after accounting for annual spending of about 5% and operating costs. Harvard and Brown have consequently added Bitcoin and Ether to higher-risk satellite allocations through spot exchange-traded funds.

Form 13F filings released on February 13, 2026, showed that Harvard Management Company had cut its BlackRock IBIT holding by 21% to 5.35 million shares as of December 31, 2025, with a market value of $265.8 million. It also bought 3.87 million shares of ETHA for the first time that quarter, worth $86.8 million, bringing the combined value of the two positions to $352.6 million. Brown University held 212,500 IBIT shares over the same period, worth about $10.6 million.