Two Abu Dhabi sovereign buyers stored their BlackRock Bitcoin ETF holdings unchanged via the second quarter, retaining $764 million of publicity even because the cryptocurrency remained mired in one among its steepest annual declines.
Mubadala Funding Firm and the Abu Dhabi Funding Council held a mixed 22.94 million shares of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Belief ETF (IBIT) as of June 30, regulatory filings present.
Neither diminished its share depend throughout the quarter.
The choice meant the funds absorbed the decline in IBIT. Their mixed positions have been valued at about $881.4 million on the finish of March, implying roughly $118 million of worth was erased throughout the second quarter although the variety of shares remained unchanged. Mubadala’s stake alone fell in reported worth to $490.1 million from $565.6 million.
Mubadala held 14,721,917 IBIT shares as of June 30, the identical quantity it owned three months earlier. The place remained its second-largest reported holding in its $34.8 billion 13F portfolio, behind GlobalFoundries.
The sovereign investor had elevated its place by nearly 16% throughout the first quarter, including greater than 2 million shares as Bitcoin weakened. It had beforehand boosted the stake by about 46% within the remaining quarter of 2025.
Abu Dhabi invests $437M in Bitcoin ETFs, Wisconsin doubles its holdings
Abu Dhabi added IBIT shares to its $302 billion in belongings underneath administration, whereas SWIB surpassed $320M in BTC publicity.
Abu Dhabi Funding Council (ADIC) additionally stood pat, retaining 8,218,712 IBIT shares value about $273.6 million as of June 30. IBIT was its largest reported US-listed place, accounting for over 33% of its roughly $715 million 13F portfolio.
ADIC started reporting the place instantly earlier this 12 months after its subsidiary Al Warda Investments had beforehand disclosed the stake. The reporting change didn’t alter the useful possession of the shares.
Bitcoin slides
The unchanged positions stand out towards Bitcoin’s efficiency this 12 months.
Bitcoin traded close to $62,900 on Friday, down about 29% from roughly $88,700 at the beginning of 2026. The cryptocurrency has additionally fallen by roughly half from the file above $126,000 reached final October.
BlackRock knowledge present IBIT was down 27.6% this 12 months via Aug. 13, with internet belongings falling to about $47.35 billion. Its shares closed at $35.88 Thursday.
The broader ETF market displays this retreat, with Bitcoin ETFs shedding round $40 billion in belongings underneath administration, from greater than $116.7 billion to round $95.5 billion, based on knowledge from SoSoValue.
Meaning the Abu Dhabi buyers have to this point responded in another way from establishments which have used the downturn to chop publicity.
Harvard College, for instance, diminished its IBIT place by 43% throughout the first quarter after already trimming it late final 12 months. Mubadala elevated its holdings throughout that very same interval, whereas ADIC stored its stake unchanged.
Michael Tanguma, chief government of Onramp Bitcoin, mentioned Abu Dhabi can also maintain Bitcoin instantly in chilly storage, arguing that relying solely on an ETF construction can be uncommon for a sovereign investor searching for long-term publicity.
Kind 13F disclosures cowl specified US-listed securities and wouldn’t reveal Bitcoin held instantly in sovereign-controlled wallets, that means the filings neither verify nor rule out Tanguma’s assertion.
Abu Dhabi deepens its crypto push
These funds’ resolution to keep up their Bitcoin positions comes as Abu Dhabi builds a broader institutional presence throughout digital belongings, spanning regulation, enterprise funding, tokenization and crypto infrastructure.
Abu Dhabi World Market, the emirate’s worldwide monetary heart, has operated a devoted virtual-asset regulatory framework since 2018 and mentioned late final 12 months that greater than 20 regulated corporations have been licensed to conduct actions involving digital belongings or fiat-referenced tokens.
Binance acquired a world license underneath the framework in December, whereas Coinbase secured regulatory approval this week to determine a global tokenization hub in Abu Dhabi.
State-linked capital has moved alongside that regulatory growth. Abu Dhabi-backed MGX agreed final 12 months to speculate $2 billion in Binance, one of many largest institutional investments ever made in a crypto firm.
Individually, Hub71, Abu Dhabi’s government-backed know-how ecosystem, established a devoted digital-assets program with greater than $2 billion of capital dedicated to Web3 and blockchain startups.
Mubadala itself has additionally expanded past merely proudly owning Bitcoin via an ETF. Its asset-management arm, Mubadala Capital, moved one among its private-market funds onchain in July, making the technique accessible in tokenized type throughout Base, Solana and Sui.
These initiatives present an Abu Dhabi funding technique that has more and more handled digital belongings as a part of its monetary infrastructure relatively than solely as a speculative commerce.
