MSCI to drop Bitcoin holder Strategy from its stock indexes

MSCI ↗ 0.71% will remove Michael Saylor's Strategy ↗ 0.37% and several other companies from its global equity indexes after concluding that they look more like investment funds than operating businesses. The decision could cut off passive fund demand for the largest corporate holder of Bitcoin ↗ 0.42%.reuters.com

The removal was announced on Wednesday in the results of MSCI's November 2026 Index Review. It takes Strategy out of the MSCI USA Index under new eligibility rules that take effect at the close of Nov. 30. Bloomberg reported that the move could trigger billions of dollars in stock sales and put more pressure on the financing model behind Saylor's Bitcoin holdings. Strategy shares fell 0.8% in extended trading on Wednesday, according to Reuters. The stock has dropped about 20% this year, while Bitcoin is down 15%.bloomberg.com+1

Other companies cut

Strategy was not the only company removed. Tokyo-listed Metaplanet, another Bitcoin holder, and UK-based uranium buyer Yellow Cake were also on the exclusion list, and the deleted companies will leave the MSCI USA and MSCI World indexes on Dec. 1. Metaplanet is being removed from MSCI's Japan Small Cap Index. Ether treasury company Sharplink was not among the deletions, and MSCI's review documents did not explain any of the individual removals.kelo.com+1

Investing.com reported that Strategy's float-adjusted value of $37.3 billion makes it the largest company affected by the new framework. JPMorgan ↗ 0.39% analysts estimated last year that a removal could force about $2.8 billion of Strategy shares out of passive funds, though that figure was based on MSCI's earlier proposal rather than the final rule.finance.yahoo.com+1

A yearlong review

MSCI first proposed excluding digital asset treasury companies whose holdings make up 50% or more of their total assets. It later widened that into a review of what it calls "non-operating companies," which have fund-like characteristics that its benchmarks exclude. The rules adopted on Oct. 15 first check whether a company's operating assets exceed half of its total assets. Companies that fail that test are then scored on five financial ratios, and those flagged on four or more become ineligible. A current index member is removed only if it fails the screen in both of its two most recent annual filing periods.bitcoinmagazine.com+1

Strategy had pushed back against the change. Saylor and CEO Phong Le called the proposed treatment of digital asset treasuries "discriminatory." In a September letter, the company argued that exclusion would not meaningfully affect its business but would damage MSCI's reputation as a neutral index provider.theblock.co