Italian banking giant Intesa Sanpaolo disclosed $96 million in bitcoin ETF holdings and a substantial options position tied to Strategy shares, along with lower crypto-linked exposure.
In a 13F filing for the quarter ending December 2025, the bank lists five spot bitcoin ETF positions, including $72.6 million in the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF and $23.4 million in the iShares Bitcoin Trust, for a total exposure of just over $96 million.
It also includes a $4.3 million stake in the Bitwise Solana Stake ETF, which tracks the value of solana. and capture staking rewards.
The bank also posted a large put option position in Strategy, the largest corporate bitcoin holder with 714,644 BTC on its balance sheet, valued at approximately $184.6 million.
That put option gives the company the opportunity, but not the obligation, to sell MSTR shares at a specific price in the future. The position, along with the directional long position in bitcoin ETFs, could reflect a trade that capitalizes on the company’s trading above the value of its BTC holdings, measured by the multiple of net asset value (mNAV), which compares the value of the company to the value of bitcoin.
The strategy was trading at 2.9mNAV at one point and is now at 1.21mNAV, according to its website. That gap closing would see the position turn a profit as the stock price fell to the level of his bitcoin holdings.
The filing also shows equity stakes in cryptocurrency-linked companies, including Coinbase, Robinhood, BitMine and ETHZilla. These are smaller positions, and the largest, of around $4.4 million, is in Circle.
The document uses the designation “DFND” (Shared-Defined), indicating that the investment decisions were made jointly by Intesa Sanpaolo SpA and affiliated asset managers. It is not yet clear whether those asset managers are Intesa’s own trading desk or institutional clients.
This structure is common when the parent bank exercises centralized supervision or strategy while subsidiaries execute operations. CoinDesk reached out to Intesa Sanapolo for comment but did not receive a response at the time of writing.
The bank’s US wealth management division filed a separate 13F with no exposure to digital assets.
Early last year, Intesa Sanapolo bought 11 bitcoins for more than $1 million. The company has had its own trading desk for years, which also deals with cryptocurrency trading.
