Original article "Put the Crypto in the Index Funds", translated by Odaily Planet Daily jk.

Original author: Matt Levine is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist responsible for financial reporting, consistently ranking first in readership among Bloomberg's financial opinions. He was an editor at Dealbreaker, worked in the investment banking division at Goldman Sachs, served as a mergers and acquisitions lawyer at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, and was a law clerk for a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

What strategy has Vanguard adopted?

A fundamental situation today is that the U.S. stock market is willing to pay $2 for a $1 cryptocurrency valuation. If a small public company holds $100 million worth of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, or Trump Coin, its market value will at least rise to $200 million. This kind of trading seems both confusing and magical. The pioneer of this approach is MicroStrategy (which has now simply shortened its name to "Strategy," holding about $70 billion in Bitcoin with a market value of approximately $138 billion), and now various small companies are continuously imitating it, appearing to be quite successful.

I often joke about this, but it does raise a serious question: Why is the stock market willing to pay $2 for a $1 cryptocurrency? This question can generally be divided into three explanations:

• Bitcoin held by companies is worth more than Bitcoin held by individuals. Because companies can use these crypto assets to do things you can't, such as educating investors, borrowing, leveraging, staking, tokenizing, and various other "operations." From a business perspective, this premium is reasonable.

• There is a large amount of institutional capital wanting to buy Bitcoin, but they can't, as they cannot hold it directly or through more conventional (lower premium) means like futures or ETFs. So they are willing to pay a premium to invest indirectly through these "crypto vault-type companies." This premium arises from market structural imbalances: these companies provide a "legitimate and compliant" investment form for institutional investors.

• Retail investors are both lazy and confused, following the trend to buy these stocks labeled as "crypto vaults," completely unaware that they are buying a bunch of overvalued crypto assets. In simple terms, this is the "meme stock effect."

Every company engaging in this operation will claim the first reason — "We are not just hoarding coins; we will do a lot of things," but I have always found this unconvincing. The third explanation — "Haha, retail investors" — sounds quite reasonable, and I have written similar viewpoints (for many small U.S. public companies, the most direct appeal of the crypto vault strategy is: no one pays attention to our small company, but if we announce that we bought a bunch of cryptocurrencies, retail investors will get excited and rush in to buy our stock at a high price.")

But what is truly interesting is the second point. If this logic holds: "Large asset management firms want exposure to cryptocurrencies, and Strategy is the only convenient channel for them to buy, so they are willing to pay a 100% premium for its stock," then… this sounds super strange, but maybe it's true? I checked the shareholder list of Strategy on Bloomberg, and the second-largest shareholder is Capital Group — a traditional fund management company focused on active investment, holding 6.99%. Is this a good investment? Over the past 12 months, Strategy's stock price has risen about 175% while the S&P 500 has only risen 13%. So… yes?

Then why doesn't Capital buy Bitcoin directly and instead pays double the price for Strategy? (As short-seller Jim Chanos has questioned) Maybe they want to buy it but can't: this part of Capital's holdings comes from its Growth Fund of America, which "primarily invests in common stocks" and "can invest in other types of equity securities," but clearly does not include Bitcoin or Bitcoin ETFs. If you are a long-term fund manager who only invests in stocks and want to buy Bitcoin, then over the past year, (1) you were right, (2) but you couldn't buy it. So, buying Strategy might be your only practical option.

(Should you be able to do this? Should the fund's investment authorization be modified? Are your clients paying you to help them buy Bitcoin? Is this your job? I don't know, but what is certain is: you are not actually buying Bitcoin; you are buying shares of Strategy.)

Therefore, the high premium on Strategy's stock may reflect an expectation: "Institutional investors want to buy 'Bitcoin in stock form,' but market supply cannot keep up." Another related but slightly different view is: "Index funds will passively buy Strategy, regardless of how high the premium is." Capital is the second-largest shareholder, but according to Bloomberg's Vildana Hajric, the largest shareholder is actually Vanguard:

"Bitcoin is not suitable for long-term investors. Digital assets are more speculative than investment. They are an 'immature asset class' with no clear history and no 'intrinsic economic value,' which could cause 'serious disruption' to portfolios."

Vanguard's executives have consistently upheld the logic of founder Jack Bogle, taking a critical stance on crypto assets. Ironically, according to the "cold logic" of passive investment in index funds, this $10 trillion asset management giant has now become the largest shareholder of Strategy — a software company that has turned itself into a "shadow company for Bitcoin."

Vanguard owns over 20 million shares of Strategy, accounting for nearly 8% of its Class A common stock, likely surpassing Capital Group in the fourth quarter of last year. According to Bloomberg data, these holdings are distributed across dozens of Vanguard funds, covering various index products such as small-cap, mid-cap, momentum, value, and growth.

And Strategy hasn't even entered the S&P 500 index yet! ("Vanguard's largest holding is its total market index fund VITSX, which holds about 5.7 million shares, valued at approximately $2.6 billion.") However, Strategy is working hard to get included. Just think about how lively it would be if it actually made it into the index.

And: is there really a problem with this? Although I often joke about these matters, what do I know? Just yesterday, I mocked a newly launched "crypto vault company" whose asset reserve is the HYPE token. I wrote, "This name is too straightforward." However, I also often mock some ordinary public companies, and their stock prices sometimes still rise. This article is not investment advice; most of my money is also in index funds. I have learned a lesson: the financial phenomena I want to mock have no relation to whether they will rise. I have no predictive ability, so I try to choose to be a price taker — buy the market portfolio and accept market returns. Many investors should actually do this or are already doing it.

In 2005, the "market portfolio" was mostly stocks and bonds; by 2025, it undoubtedly also includes cryptocurrencies. There are many ways to access crypto assets now (you can buy Bitcoin directly, buy Bitcoin ETFs, etc.), and there will certainly be people emailing me about their startup projects that can help you conveniently gain exposure to crypto indices (for example, give them $100, and they will allocate a basket of crypto assets for you based on market capitalization).

But the simplest and laziest way is to buy the entire U.S. stock market index directly. Because the current stock market has been continuously absorbing more and more "crypto vault companies." You may not want crypto assets to appear in your stock index fund — Vanguard doesn't want that either — but the essence of index funds is: it's not about buying what you want, but about buying what the market wants. (And it's not about what the fund manager wants to buy.)

You don't trust yourself (or the fund manager) to pick the right things, so you choose to trust the market. And right now, what the market wants is cryptocurrencies.

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