MSCI deletes Strategy from USA, World and ACWI indexes

What happened

MSCI confirmed on Wednesday that Strategy, the largest corporate holder of bitcoin, will leave the MSCI USA Index at the close of Nov. 30 as part of the provider's November 2026 Index Review. The results were posted shortly after 5 p.m. ET, the time the market had been waiting on. Because the USA Index feeds broader benchmarks, the deletion also removes the company from the MSCI World and ACWI indexes.

Strategy was one of five names cut in the review. Japan's Metaplanet leaves the MSCI Japan Small Cap Index, uranium holder Yellow Cake exits the MSCI United Kingdom Small Cap Index, Iceland's Skel Fjárfestingafélag comes out of the Iceland Frontier Markets Small Cap Index, and micro-cap Upexi is dropped from the USA Micro Cap Index. All five had already been marked Deleted on MSCI's potential-impact list, which was built on Sept. 30 financial data and Oct. 9 market values. Strategy was the only large cap in the group and accounted for more than 90% of the five companies' combined float-adjusted market value on that list.

The 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. Earlier in the session the stock was up 0.88% at $122.14 while crypto-linked peers ran further, with Coinbase up 3.34% and BitMine up 5.67%, Blockonomi reported. Strategy is down 9.1% for the week and 18.9% for the year.

Why it matters

Funds that track an MSCI index have to hold what the index holds, so managers will have to sell the deleted stocks by the Nov. 30 close. That estimate was built on MSCI's earlier digital-asset proposal rather than the screen adopted in October, and MSCI itself has published no figure.

Strategy has argued the effect would be limited. In an August letter the company said a deletion "would have no meaningful impact on Strategy's business," and it has said funds tracking MSCI's global investable indexes hold 3.1% of its basic shares outstanding, roughly 13 million units. At $123 that works out to about $1.6 billion, which the company describes as less than a single day of trading volume. A removal does not delist the stock, and nothing in the rules requires 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.

What the data shows

Strategy held 850,364 bitcoin as of Nov. 8, acquired at an average price of $75,456 per coin for an aggregate $64.16 billion. With bitcoin trading near $74,000 on Wednesday, about 2% below that average cost, the position was worth roughly $63 billion, or about 4.05% of the 21 million supply. The company bought 1,036 bitcoin for $81.9 million in the week to Nov. 8, a purchase that left its holdings below its average cost.

Funding has also drawn attention. Strategy reports a BTC Yield of negative 3.7% for 2026, and its STRC preferred stock trades below its $100 stated amount; Saylor said on Feb. 5 that the company does not sell STRC below 100. It sold about $432 million of bitcoin through the third quarter to cover preferred dividends and fund STRC buybacks, and the board has approved sales of up to $1.25 billion. Third-quarter dividends cost $419.6 million, software revenue was $125.4 million, and the at-the-market program raised $5.41 billion net. In the week to Nov. 8 the company spent more on buybacks than on bitcoin. U.S. spot bitcoin ETFs saw $95 million of net outflows on Nov. 10, a fourth straight day.

Background

It adopted the new methodology on Oct. 15 with minor modifications and said it would end the interim measures placed on such companies in October 2025, including a freeze on share-count increases and a deferral of additions. The rule does not mention bitcoin. It first tests whether operating assets equal at least 50% of total assets; issuers that fail face five financial ratios, and a company flagged on four or more is ineligible for the MSCI Global Investable Market Indexes. Buffers protect existing members: a company outside the indexes cannot be added if it fails the screen in either of its two most recent annual filing periods, while a current constituent is removed only if it fails in both. MSCI said the same non-operating treatment will apply to its U.S. Index Series.

The company pushed back during the consultation. An Aug. 31 letter from Michael Saylor and chief executive Phong Le called the proposal "discriminatory, arbitrary, and misguided." Saylor has described Strategy as an operating business rather than an investment fund, and the company reports its bitcoin treasury as an operating segment under U.S. GAAP.

What to watch

Seventeen other constituents were on MSCI's potential watchlist, including SharpLink, TON Strategy and Solana Company, and none of them appeared among Wednesday's published deletions. Metaplanet, the other bitcoin treasury company in the deleted group, sold bitcoin last quarter to show investors it could tap its holdings for liquidity. Whether other index providers follow MSCI's lead remains an open question, and so does the practical size of the selling between now and the Nov. 30 close.

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