Strategy tells MSCI ‘Bitcoin doesn’t need you’ as $2.8 billion index risk hangs over MSTR
Strategy faces a renewed risk of elimination from main MSCI fairness indexes underneath a broader screening proposal that might set off an estimated $2.8 billion in passive promoting.
MSCI opened a session this month on guidelines designed to establish “non-operating corporations” by means of their monetary statements.
The agency famous that making use of the proposed methodology to the MSCI ACWI IMI utilizing May 2026 information would have resulted in three deletions, together with Michael Saylor-led Strategy, Tokyo-listed Bitcoin holder Metaplanet, and London-listed uranium investor Yellow Cake.
Strategy pushed again in opposition to the premise of MSCI’s proposal, arguing that index suppliers ought to mirror markets moderately than affect company asset allocation.
It mentioned:
“MSCI’s proposal places it out of step with regulators, markets, and its personal prospects. Bitcoin doesn’t need MSCI. Neither does Strategy.”
Strategy’s MSTR shares fell about 2% in pre-market buying and selling following the information.
MSCI replaces its crypto threshold with a broader monetary take a look at
MSCI’s newest strategy reaches a lot additional than the crypto-only rule it deserted earlier this yr.
The earlier session targeted on corporations whose major enterprise concerned Bitcoin or different digital-asset treasury actions and proposed excluding companies when digital belongings represented a minimum of 50% of whole belongings.
MSCI dropped that plan in January, saying digital-asset treasury corporations would stay eligible whereas it studied the broader class of companies whose actions appeared predominantly investment-oriented.
The August proposal resulted from that broader evaluation.
Under the brand new methodology, an organization first faces a core display screen measuring working belongings as a proportion of whole belongings. An organization with working belongings above 50% passes. Those beneath that degree transfer to a second stage consisting of 5 monetary assessments.
Those assessments look at working belongings, working bills, money technology, publicity to fair-value actions, and dependence on exterior capital.
For corporations looking for inclusion, MSCI’s proposed flags embody working belongings beneath 20% of whole belongings, working bills beneath 5%, unfavourable working money stream and non-operating fair-value adjustments above 5% of whole belongings.
The capital-dependence take a look at would flag corporations whose financing money stream exceeds 20% of belongings and whose filings present capital elevating was used to build up belongings.
Triggering a minimum of 4 of the 5 flags after failing the core display screen would make an organization ineligible for the index.
Meanwhile, present index constituents obtain extra room earlier than deletion. For these corporations, working asset depth must fall beneath 10% moderately than 20%, whereas capital dependence must exceed 30% moderately than 20%.
They would additionally must fail the take a look at throughout two consecutive annual critiques earlier than MSCI eliminated them. Companies that fail solely on the newest submitting would as a substitute go onto a public watchlist.
That persistence requirement is why the session doesn’t translate instantly into an instantaneous Strategy deletion.
Yellow Cake’s inclusion additionally demonstrates how far MSCI has moved past its earlier strategy. The firm owns bodily uranium, but its asset-heavy construction introduced it into the identical display screen as Strategy and Metaplanet.
Strategy-focused analyst Adam Livingston mentioned the revised methodology represents a extra credible risk than MSCI’s earlier crypto-specific effort as a result of it applies a basic monetary framework moderately than singling out Bitcoin treasury corporations.
Livingston’s personal evaluation suggests Strategy might be weak on working asset depth, expense depth and fair-value publicity, whereas constructive working money stream and financing money stream of roughly 26% of belongings might permit it to keep away from two different flags. That would depart it with three failures, one in need of MSCI’s four-test requirement.
Index strain arrives as Strategy sells Bitcoin
The renewed MSCI threat comes as Strategy’s long-running Bitcoin accumulation cycle has already slowed, with the corporate promoting BTC and directing more capital toward cash reserves and obligations tied to its increasing securities construction.
Strategy has bought greater than 6,000 BTC in latest weeks and has not disclosed a brand new Bitcoin buy for practically two months. Its holdings have fallen to roughly 840,447 BTC, whereas its dollar reserve has climbed to about $4.7 billion.
The gross sales mark a change from the mannequin that drove Strategy’s Bitcoin holdings sharply greater over the previous a number of years. The firm has traditionally issued frequent inventory and different securities, then used a lot of the proceeds to buy Bitcoin.
However, that strategy has modified extra just lately, and Bitcoin itself has change into a supply of liquidity underneath its wider capital-management mannequin. This framework permits Strategy to lift fairness and most popular inventory, situation debt, use money, or promote Bitcoin relying on relative market circumstances and its monetary obligations.
An MSCI elimination might make a type of funding channels much less efficient.
JPMorgan analysts estimated throughout MSCI’s earlier session that Strategy could face about $2.8 billion of selling if it had been faraway from MSCI indexes. The estimate rose considerably if different main index suppliers adopted.
Such promoting would happen in MSTR shares held by index-tracking buyers. It wouldn’t instantly take away money from Strategy or robotically require the corporate to promote any of its Bitcoin.
The secondary impact might be extra essential for its accumulation technique.
Strategy has benefited from intervals when MSTR traded at a premium to the worth of the Bitcoin underlying every share. Selling frequent inventory at elevated valuations allowed the corporate to lift capital and purchase extra Bitcoin whereas limiting the dilution required for every greenback raised.
Livingston said a big wave of index-related promoting might push MSTR decrease and compress that premium, weakening the economics of future fairness issuance. At a $95 share worth, his $2.8 billion situation would equate to roughly 29.5 million shares altering fingers.
That risk is extra pronounced as Strategy tries to balance its Bitcoin ownership in opposition to most popular dividends, debt, and its rising money reserve. An index exclusion would add one other supply of strain to a capital construction that has just lately shifted from uninterrupted Bitcoin accumulation towards extra lively liquidity administration.
Still, even a big MSCI-driven selloff would depart Strategy holding a whole bunch of hundreds of Bitcoin. Livingston argues that the larger risk is to the pace and effectivity of future accumulation.
October resolution approaches as merchants worth greater elimination odds
The uncertainty now strikes towards an October deadline, giving Strategy and MSCI lower than two months earlier than the proposed framework might transfer from session to index coverage.
MSCI will settle for suggestions by means of Sept. 30 and expects to announce its resolution on or earlier than Oct. 16. Any permitted adjustments are proposed for implementation through the November 2026 Index Review. MSCI additionally cautioned that the session could end in some, all, or not one of the proposed adjustments.
Prediction market merchants have change into more and more skeptical that Strategy will survive the yr with out an MSCI elimination.
A Polymarket contract overlaying whether Strategy will be removed from both the MSCI World or MSCI USA Index by Dec. 31 was pricing the chance at about 73% this week. The sign comes with a big caveat: solely about $5,700 had traded within the year-end contract despite the fact that the broader occasion web page confirmed greater than $1.18 million in quantity, most of it tied to earlier, already resolved deadlines.
Using the proposed methodology and May filings, Strategy already appeared among the many three corporations marked for deletion.
The October outcome will decide whether or not that simulated consequence stays theoretical or turns into a brand new constraint on Strategy’s capital-markets mannequin.
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