The crypto market had a largely rough spell in the first quarter of the year, with the price of Bitcoin falling to as low as $62,000 by early February. While several institutional investors reduced their exposure as the digital assets underperformed, others took the downtime as an opportunity to load up their bags. Below is a look at how some institutional players allocated (or retrieved) capital from the crypto market in the first quarter of 2026.
Abu Dhabi Sovereign Wealth Fund Increases Its IBIT Holdings, Harvard Downsizes
Friday, May 15th, was the deadline for institutional investors and asset managers to disclose their investment holdings as of the end of 2026’s first quarter. One of the most interesting disclosures on the day came from Mubadala Investment Company, one of Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth vehicles.
According to the Form 13F filed with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the sovereign wealth fund revealed a significant increase in its exposure to crypto through BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) exchange-traded fund (ETF). The fund increased its stake in the largest BTC ETF from 12,702,323 shares previously to 14,721,917 shares (worth roughly $566 million) as of March 31st.
Some traditional financial institutions also increased their crypto exposure while hedging their downside risk. For instance, the Royal Bank of Canada disclosed adding to its IBIT holdings while applying contingent options (calls and puts) to cover its positions.
The Bank of Nova Scotia, another Canadian institution, purchased 214,370 IBIT shares in the first quarter of the year. Meanwhile, Barclays revealed a layered position in the BlackRock Bitcoin exchange-traded fund, along with large put and call options (with the IBIT ETF as underlying).
Interestingly, most major university endowment funds (except Harvard) disclosed no significant changes in their exposure to the crypto market. Harvard University, which holds one of the largest crypto ETF positions among academic institutions, has continued to reduce its holdings in BlackRock’s Bitcoin exchange-traded fund.
After cutting its IBIT position by 21% in the fourth quarter of 2025, Harvard endowment further decreased its holdings of the IBIT ETF and completely liquidated its Ether ETF position. The university disclosed 3,044,612 IBIT shares as of March 31st (worth about $117 million), a 43% reduction from its 5.35 million-share position at the end of 2025.
Other Ivy League universities, Brown and Dartmouth, revealed no changes in their 212,500-share and 201,531-share holdings in BlackRock’s IBIT in the previous quarter. However, Dartmouth disclosed shifting its Ether exposure from the Grayscale Ethereum Mini Trust into Grayscale’s Ethereum Staking ETF, while opening a new 304,803-share position (valued at $3.67 million) in the Bitwise Solana Staking ETF.
Increased activity of institutional investors in the crypto market is often seen as validation of the digital asset industry as a whole. Hence, these disclosures suggest that the large-scale investors might have viewed the earlier underperformance of the crypto market as a buying opportunity rather than as an indictment of its long-term potential.
Crypto Market Cap Overview
As of this writing, the crypto market capitalization stands at around $2.57 trillion, reflecting an over 1% decline in the past day. While the market has somewhat recovered over the past two months, it is still down by more than 12% so far in 2026.
The crypto total market cap on the daily timeframe | Source: TOTAL chart on TradingView
Featured image from iStock, chart from TradingView
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