Italian banking giant Intesa Sanpaolo has disclosed $96 million in Bitcoin ETF holdings and a substantial options position linked to strategy stocks, as well as a smaller crypto-related exposure.
In a 13F filing for the quarter ending December 2025, the bank lists five Bitcoin ETF spot 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 Staking ETF, which tracks the value of Solana. and captures staking rewards.
The bank also posted a large put option position on Strategy, the largest Bitcoin holding company with 714,644 BTC on its balance sheet, valued at approximately $184.6 million.
This put option gives the company the option, but not the obligation, to sell MSTR stock at a specific price in the future. The position, coupled with the directionally long Bitcoin ETF position, could reflect a trade capitalizing on the company trading above the value of its BTC holdings, as measured by the multiple of net asset value (mNAV), which compares the company’s value to the value of bitcoin.
The strategy was at one point trading at 2.9 mNAV and now stands at 1.21 mNAV, according to its website. This reduced spread would allow the position to turn a profit as the stock price falls back to the level of its bitcoin holdings.
The filing also shows stakes in crypto-related companies including Coinbase, Robinhood, BitMine and ETHZilla. These are minor positions, the largest being approximately $4.4 million in Circle.
The filing uses the designation “DFND” (Shared-Defined), indicating that investment decisions were made jointly by Intesa Sanpaolo SpA and affiliated asset managers. It remains unclear whether these asset managers are Intesa’s own trading floor or institutional clients.
This structure is common when the parent bank exercises centralized oversight or strategy while subsidiaries execute trades. CoinDesk reached out to Intesa Sanapolo for comment but did not receive a response as of this writing.
The bank’s US wealth management arm filed a separate 13F with no exposure to digital assets.
Early last year, Intesa Sanapolo purchased 11 bitcoins for over $1 million. The company has had a proprietary trading desk for years, which also handles cryptocurrency trading.
