Italy's Largest Bank Slashed Bitcoin ETF Holdings to Triple Its Staked Ether Bet

Intesa Sanpaolo cut its iShares Bitcoin Trust position by 94%

Intesa Sanpaolo, Italy's largest banking group, reduced its common holding in BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust to 40,723 shares as of 30 June 2026. That marks a 93.7% drop from the 646,809 shares it held three months earlier. The figures come from the bank's Form 13F, a quarterly report that large United States money managers file with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Intesa submitted the filing on 31 July 2026. It captures positions held at quarter-end, not trades made on any single date.

The bank tripled its staked Ether ETF holdings

Over the same three months, Intesa moved the other way on Ethereum. The bank lifted its stake in the iShares Staked Ethereum Trust exchange-traded fund (ETF) to 349,600 shares, up from 116,200 at the end of March. That holding slightly more than tripled. The fund tracks the price of Ether and reflects staking rewards earned on part of its assets. The position was worth about $7.1 million at quarter-end, according to Cointelegraph. Together, the two moves show the bank favouring Ether over Bitcoin in its disclosed exposure.

Bitcoin call options shrank as a new put appeared

The reset extended to Bitcoin options. The underlying-share amount tied to Intesa's reported call position fell 99.3%, to 18,000 shares from 2,496,500 at the end of March. The bank also disclosed a new put position representing 500,000 underlying shares. No comparable put appeared in its previous quarterly filing. Form 13F reports long securities and certain long options. It excludes written options and omits strike prices, expiry dates and premiums.

The filing shows a snapshot, not a strategy

Those limits matter. The disclosure cannot confirm a bearish Bitcoin stance, because it does not show the bank's net exposure. It also cannot reveal whether the new put served as a hedge or a directional bet. The document records balances on 30 June 2026, not the individual trades that produced them.

Other crypto ETF positions moved in different directions

Intesa's largest single crypto ETF holding stayed in Bitcoin through the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF (ARKB), at about 3.47 million shares. That position edged down roughly 4% from the first quarter, Cointelegraph reported. The bank held 712,319 shares of the Grayscale XRP Trust ETF at both quarter-ends, an unchanged balance. Its Bitwise Solana Staking ETF position nearly vanished, falling to seven shares from 2,817. The identical XRP figure does not confirm whether the bank traded the fund during the quarter.

Ether traded near $1,872 at the time of publication

Ether traded at $1,872.16 at the time of publication, up 0.33% over the past 24 hours (CoinPaprika, 4 August 2026). The token held a market value of about $225 billion. Intesa's enlarged Ethereum position now sits beside a Bitcoin holding that the bank cut sharply during the second quarter.

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