A New Screen Targets Bitcoin Treasury Companies

Index provider MSCI has opened a consultation on new eligibility criteria for its Global Investable Market Indexes (GIMI), the benchmark family used by trillions of dollars in passive funds worldwide. The proposed rules would screen out companies with limited operating businesses relative to their balance sheets, a category that captures corporate bitcoin treasury firms whose primary activity is holding the cryptocurrency rather than running a traditional operating business.

The screen measures five factors, namely operating asset intensity, operating expense intensity, cash generation, fair value changes and dependence on outside capital. Under the proposed thresholds, a company would need operating assets above 20% of total assets, operating expenses above 5%, positive operating cash flow, fair value changes below 5% of total assets, and capital dependence below 20% to stay eligible. A company that fails at least four of the five tests would be removed.

Strategy, the Nasdaq-listed company chaired by Michael Saylor that holds 840,447 bitcoin, fails all five criteria based on its financial filings, per MSCI’s own simulation. A separate run using more recent data identifies Strategy, Japan’s Metaplanet and uranium investment firm Yellow Cake as the companies most likely to be deleted from the MSCI ACWI Investable Market Index.

Lastly, at least three other digital-asset-linked firms, including ether treasury company Sharplink, would land on a watchlist for future review rather than face immediate removal.

Billions in Passive Selling at Stake

The stakes are significant because of how much passive capital tracks MSCI’s indexes. Analysts have put the potential forced-selling pressure on Strategy alone at $1.8 billion to $2.0 billion if the stock is deleted, since index funds and exchange-traded funds that mirror the GIMI benchmarks would be required to sell their holdings to stay compliant.

An earlier version of the proposal drew a warning from JPMorgan that outflows could reach $2.8 billion if MSCI acts alone, or as much as $8.8 billion if other major index providers, such as FTSE Russell and S&P Dow Jones, adopt similar screens.

Strategy has pushed back publicly, arguing that bitcoin should be treated as a legitimate treasury reserve asset rather than grounds for index exclusion, and the company has joined a coalition of other bitcoin treasury firms challenging the proposed rule during MSCI’s comment period.

The pushback reflects a broader industry argument that has circulated since MSCI first floated the idea, i.e. a company holding bitcoin instead of cash, gold or short-term bonds is making a treasury decision, not fundamentally changing its business, and should not be penalized on that basis alone.

Timing Collides With a Rough Stretch for Strategy

MSCI’s proposal-laden doc lands at an awkward moment for Strategy given that the company posted an $8.2 billion quarterly loss after previously reporting a $14 billion profit, a swing driven by unrealized losses on its bitcoin holdings as the asset’s price pulled back earlier in 2026.

Chief Executive Phong Le has said Strategy plans to resume bitcoin accumulation later this year after a pause, and the company has rolled out new reporting metrics, including Net BTC Per Share and BTC Hurdle ARR, aimed at showing investors what its bitcoin holdings are worth once debt and preferred-stock obligations are stripped out.

Metaplanet, which has built its own bitcoin treasury to roughly 40,177 BTC and modeled much of its strategy on Strategy’s playbook, faces the same exclusion risk despite its rapid growth. Both companies argue their equity structures already price in bitcoin exposure efficiently enough that index inclusion should not hinge on how much of their balance sheet sits in operating assets versus a single reserve asset.