Norway’s sovereign fund reaches record 11,549 BTC exposure without buying more Bitcoin
Norway’s sovereign wealth fund ended the primary half of 2026 with record oblique Bitcoin exposure and a newly disclosed stake on this planet’s largest Ethereum treasury firm.
Norges Bank Investment Management’s (NBIM) public-equity holdings translated into 11,549 BTC of oblique exposure as of June 30, up 60% from a yr earlier and marking the sixth consecutive reporting interval of progress, K33 Research information showed.
The exposure was price about 6.7 billion kroner, or $676 million, on the finish of the interval.
The improve has largely come via listed corporations that maintain Bitcoin on their stability sheets, quite than via purchases made by the sovereign fund itself.
That distinction is central to understanding the pattern.
Norges Bank, Norway’s central financial institution, manages the Government Pension Fund Global beneath a mandate set by the Ministry of Finance. NBIM manages the portfolio, however limits set by the ministry and Norges Bank’s Executive Board tightly constrain its means to deviate from the fund’s benchmark.
As a end result, a lot of the fund’s exposure displays the composition of worldwide public markets quite than discretionary bets on particular person corporations or belongings.
As of June 30, the fund managed 22.68 trillion kroner, with 72.1% invested in equities totaling 16.36 trillion kroner, which returned 12.95% throughout the first half. The equities helped the general fund return 9.4% and beat its benchmark by 0.22%.
The scale of that portfolio can be vital. NBIM owns stakes in roughly 7,200 corporations and about 1.5% of the world’s listed equities on common, that means corporations similar to Strategy more and more carry Bitcoin exposure into the fund just by turning into significant parts of worldwide inventory markets.
K33 mentioned this broad-market impact is the probably rationalization for NBIM’s steadily rising oblique exposure.
Strategy drove 86% of Norway’s record oblique BTC exposure
Strategy stays the dominant supply of NBIM’s oblique Bitcoin exposure, accounting for practically all the improve recorded throughout the first half of 2026.
K33 estimated that NBIM’s Strategy stake translated into 9,914 BTC-equivalent on the finish of June, or 85.8% of its complete oblique exposure, up from 7,801 BTC on the finish of 2025.
The improve of roughly 2,113 BTC via Strategy alone exceeded the roughly 2,019 BTC internet improve throughout NBIM’s total portfolio throughout the interval. That means reductions in exposure via another holdings partially offset the impact of Strategy’s continued Bitcoin accumulation.
Metaplanet was a distant second at 671 BTC-equivalent, adopted by MARA Holdings with 421 BTC, Coinbase with 183 BTC and Block with 120 BTC. Tesla, GameStop, Galaxy Digital, Bullish and a number of other smaller positions accounted for a lot of the the rest.
Meanwhile, the focus in Strategy has accompanied a fast enlargement in NBIM’s total oblique Bitcoin exposure.
K33 estimated that the determine stood at simply 1,507 BTC on the finish of 2023 earlier than rising to 2,446 BTC by June 2024, 3,839 BTC at year-end, 7,194 BTC in June 2025, 9,530 BTC on the finish of 2025 and 11,549 BTC six months later.
However, the rising quantity of Bitcoin in these holdings has not translated into a bigger share of NBIM’s portfolio.
Bitcoin-linked exposure fell to about 0.03% of complete belongings on the finish of June from 0.04% at year-end 2025, whereas its estimated worth declined from 8.41 billion kroner to six.69 billion kroner.
The divergence displays the distinction between Bitcoin-equivalent exposure and the market worth of the shares offering it.
Companies similar to Strategy continued accumulating Bitcoin, growing the quantity of BTC sitting behind NBIM’s fairness holdings, whilst falling crypto costs pushed down the worth of these corporations and Bitcoin itself. Bitcoin has declined practically 30% this yr, whereas Strategy shares have fallen about 40%.
NBIM ended the interval with more Bitcoin embedded in its portfolio however much less cash tied to that exposure. The fund’s oblique BTC place grew as a result of the businesses it owns accrued more Bitcoin.
BitMine extends NBIM’s oblique crypto exposure to Ethereum
The same dynamic is now rising on the Ethereum facet via NBIM’s newly disclosed stake in BitMine Immersion Technologies.
The Norwegian fund held 6,151,062 BitMine shares price $81.87 million on the finish of June, after reporting no place within the firm at year-end 2025. The submitting doesn’t present precisely when NBIM established the stake or the worth it paid.
BitMine, in the meantime, held 5.70 million ETH as of June 28, equal to about 4.7% of Ethereum’s circulating provide, together with 206 BTC, money, and different investments. The firm has constructed the largest corporate Ethereum treasury and ranks behind solely Strategy amongst publicly traded crypto treasury corporations by digital-asset holdings.
That makes BitMine one other route via which crypto exposure is getting into NBIM’s fairness portfolio without the fund buying the underlying asset immediately.
Unlike K33’s Bitcoin-equivalent calculation, the worth of NBIM’s BitMine place can’t be handled as a easy proxy for an equal quantity of ETH. BitMine’s shares replicate not solely its Ethereum holdings but in addition its money, different belongings, liabilities, staking income, and the premium or low cost traders assign to the corporate relative to its treasury.
Still, the broader sample is identical. NBIM’s exposure to each Bitcoin and Ethereum is more and more being formed by the stability sheets of publicly listed corporations it already owns.
That exhibits how the expansion of company crypto treasuries is embedding Bitcoin and Ethereum exposure deeper into diversified world fairness portfolios, even when the underlying investor by no means buys crypto immediately.
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