Key Takeaways
- Wisconsin's investment board bought $100M in BlackRock Bitcoin ETF shares.
- Bitcoin's value saw a slight increase following the investment news.
- The market anticipates more traditional finance funds to reveal Bitcoin ETF investments.
In the first quarter of the year, the State of Wisconsin made a significant investment in Bitcoin, purchasing 94,562 shares of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust, valued at nearly $100 million.
This purchase was detailed in the state’s quarterly 13F report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Tuesday.
Price reaction
The news of this acquisition coincided with a slight increase in Bitcoin’s price, which rose 1% to $61,957, although it was down 1.7% over the last 24 hours amid new, higher-than-expected U.S. inflation data.
Wisconsin is the pioneer state in disclosing such a large-scale purchase of Bitcoin, highlighting its investment board’s proactive stance in integrating Bitcoin into its portfolio.
Additionally, the Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB), responsible for managing over $156 billion in assets, also invested approximately $64 million in shares of Grayscale’s Bitcoin Trust (GBTC).
Timing
Eric Balchunas, a senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, commented on the unusual timing of these substantial institutional investments, noting:
Normally you don’t get these big fish institutions in the 13Fs for a year or so (when the ETF gets more liquidity) but as we’ve seen these are no ordinary launches,
