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The investment, which accounts for 20% of Harvard's reported U.S.-listed public equity holdings, is notable.
Nov 15, 2025, 9:00 p.m.
Harvard logo (Xiangkun ZHU/Unsplash/Modified by CoinDesk)
What to know:
- Harvard University's endowment has disclosed a $443 million stake in BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), making it the fund's largest known equity position.
- The investment, which accounts for 20% of Harvard's reported U.S.-listed public equity holdings, is notable as institutional investors typically avoid ETFs, favoring private equity and real estate instead.
- The move comes as the price of bitcoin has plunged over 5% in the past week, but IBIT remains the world's largest spot bitcoin ETF with nearly $75 billion in net assets.
Harvard University’s endowment has disclosed a $443 million stake in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), making the fund’s largest known equity position a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund.
According to the university’s latest 13F filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the investment fund held 6.8 million shares of IBIT as of the third quarter of 2025. The position accounts for just over 20% of its reported U.S.-listed public equity holdings.
Institutional investors, such as Harvard, typically avoid exchange-traded funds, instead favoring private equity, real estate, and direct investments. That makes this move into IBIT especially notable.
For context, Harvard's entire endowment exceeds $55 billion, meaning the IBIT investment represents less than 1% of total assets. Still, it ranks Harvard among the top 20 holders of the fund according to Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas.
The filing reveals that Harvard University’s endowment is investing in bitcoin. It comes at a time when the price of the cryptocurrency plunged more than 5% in the past week to around $96,000.
IBIT is the world’s largest spot bitcoin ETF, with nearly $75 billion in net assets according to SoSoValue data.
AI Disclaimer: Parts of this article were generated with the assistance from AI tools and reviewed by our editorial team to ensure accuracy and adherence to our standards. For more information, see CoinDesk's full AI Policy.
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