Bitcoin Magazine
MSCI Removes Strategy (MSTR) From Its USA Index, Forcing Index Funds to Sell by Nov. 30
MSCI will remove Strategy, the largest corporate bitcoin holder, from the MSCI USA Index as of the close of Nov. 30, the index provider said Wednesday, after a new screen classified the company as a non-operating issuer.
The decision is part of MSCI’s November 2026 Index Review, posted shortly after 5 p.m. ET. Official additions and deletions lists show Strategy (MSTR) out of its USA Index, which also takes it out of the broader MSCI World and ACWI indexes. The same review deletes Japan’s Metaplanet from the MSCI Japan Small Cap Index and uranium holder Yellow Cake from the MSCI United Kingdom Small Cap Index, and it removes Iceland’s Skel Fjárfestingafélag from the MSCI Iceland Frontier Markets Small Cap Index and micro-cap Upexi from the USA Micro Cap Index. All five had already been marked Deleted on MSCI’s potential-impact list, built on Sept. 30 financial data and Oct. 9 market values.
Strategy is the only large-cap name in the group and, on that October list, accounted for more than 90% of the five companies’ combined float-adjusted market value. The company held 850,364 bitcoin as of Nov. 8, acquired at an average price of $75,456 a coin, or $64.16 billion in aggregate.
Strategy shares closed at $122.35, up 1.06%, then slipped 1.51% to $120.50 in after-hours trading as of 5:34 p.m. ET.
How the MSCI screen works
The rule does not mention bitcoin. The index first checks whether a company’s operating assets equal at least 50% of total assets. Issuers that fail that core screen face five financial ratios, and a company flagged on four or more of them is ineligible for the MSCI Global Investable Market Indexes.
Buffers limit turnover. A company outside the indexes cannot be added if it fails the ineligibility screen in either of its two most recent annual filing periods, but a current constituent is removed only if it fails in each of them. The index said it may also use the most recent interim filing.
MSCI also said Wednesday that the same non-operating treatment will apply to the MSCI US Index Series.
The screen replaces an approach aimed squarely at crypto. The index first proposed in late 2025 to exclude companies whose digital assets made up 50% or more of total assets, then dropped that plan in January and opened a broader consultation in August. It adopted the new methodology on Oct. 15, with minor modifications, and said it would end the interim measures it had placed on those companies in October 2025, including a freeze on share-count increases and a deferral of additions.
What the deletion does and does not do
Funds that track an MSCI index have to hold what the index holds, so they will have to sell the deleted stocks by the Nov. 30 close. JPMorgan analysts estimated last November that an exclusion could drive about $2.8 billion of outflows from Strategy, and as much as $8.8 billion more if other index providers followed. That estimate was built on MSCI’s earlier digital-asset proposal, not the October screen, and MSCI itself has published no figure.
A removal does not delist Strategy’s stock, and nothing in the rules forces the company to sell bitcoin. The pressure lands on the shares, and through them on the premium Strategy uses to fund new purchases by selling stock.
In an August letter, the company said a deletion “would have no meaningful impact on Strategy’s business.” Strategy has also said funds tracking MSCI’s global investable indexes hold 3.1% of its basic shares outstanding, and that it reports its bitcoin treasury as an operating segment under U.S. GAAP.
Seventeen other constituents were on the potential watchlist, including SharpLink, TON Strategy and Solana Company. Those names do not appear among Wednesday’s published deletions.
Tokyo-listed Metaplanet is the other bitcoin treasury firm in the deleted group, after it sold bitcoin last quarter to show investors it could tap its holdings for liquidity. Strategy bought 1,036 bitcoin for $81.9 million in the week to Nov. 8, a purchase that left its holdings below that average cost.
This post MSCI Removes Strategy (MSTR) From Its USA Index, Forcing Index Funds to Sell by Nov. 30 first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.
