Global index provider MSCI has confirmed it will remove Michael Saylor’s Strategy and Tokyo-listed Metaplanet from its flagship equity benchmarks on December 1, following a sweeping methodology review of digital asset treasury companies. The decision, which reclassifies firms whose balance sheets are dominated by crypto or commodity reserves as “non-operating companies” resembling investment funds, threatens to sever a major pipeline of passive institutional capital for corporate Bitcoin proxies, Reuters reported.
Under MSCI’s updated screening criteria, companies holding 50% or more of their total assets in digital assets or similar non-operating reserves lose eligibility for standard equity indexes. Alongside Strategy and Metaplanet, UK-based uranium holder Yellow Cake was also placed on the exclusion list, while Ethereum treasury platform SharpLink was added to MSCI’s watchlist for future review. The changes take effect following the market close on November 30.
Although index removal does not compel Strategy or Metaplanet to sell their underlying Bitcoin holdings, cutting off passive equity demand could make future capital raises for aggressive crypto accumulation significantly more costly.
