Institutional Demand for Strategy Remains Despite MSTR Decline

The New Jersey State Pension Fund has disclosed purchasing $16 million worth of Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) stocks. With the move, the pension fund has now increased its stake in Strategy.

The purchase underscores the continued demand for MSTR among institutional investors. This has been happening despite the decline in Bitcoin price, which has also affected MSTR’s value.

Vanguard Still Has Over $3.2 Billion Stake in Strategy

The strongest indication of institutional exposure to Strategy is Vanguard. According to reports, the investment firm currently has over $3.2 billion in Strategy stake, which makes it one of the biggest holders of the stock.

Vanguard has been the biggest MSTR holder for some time now, but the decline in the stock value has led it to trim its stake over time. In Q2 of 2025, the firm reportedly reduced its stake by 10% as MSTR slipped to $360.

With the stock seeing further decline over the past few months, Vanguard, along with other institutional investors, has dumped more MSTR stock. The class of investors reportedly reduced their exposure by 15% between the second and third quarters. Vanguard, BlackRock, Capital International, and JPMorgan Chase all sold substantial amounts of stock.

Nevertheless, interest is once again picking up from institutional buyers. Beyond the New Jersey Pension fund, new filings also show that the Royal Bank of Canada acquired 1.37 million MSTR shares for $233 million.

The renewed interest from institutional buyers is likely due to Strategy strengthening its position. Despite its shares falling by 45% year-to-date to $158, the company recently increased its Bitcoin holdings to over 671,000 Bitcoin.

It has increased its cash reserve to $2.19 billion. Analysts believe this will give the company enough resources to fund payment of preferred dividends for 32 months, regardless of the market direction.

Interestingly, some analysts remain positive about MSTR despite the decline in its value. Citigroup analysts maintain a “buy” recommendationmmendation on, despite reducinging their price target to $325 per share from $485.

Will Strategy Survive a Bear Market?

Meanwhile, the renewed interest from institutional traders adds to the speculation around Strategy and its chances in a crypto bear market.  The company currently has an mNAV of 1.07, which means the value of its stock is almost at par with that of its underlying asset.

This is a far cry from the over 2.4 mNAV in late 2024, raising concerns about whether the Bitcoin treasury company will survive a bear market. Strategy chairman Michael Saylor has publicly stated that the company is built to survive even a 90% decline in the value of Bitcoin.

However, not all crypto treasury company will likely survive such a plunge in price. Already an ETH treasury company, ETHZilla has started selling part of its ETH holdings.

The company sold $74.5 million worth of ETH today to redeem outstanding secured convertible notes. It marks its second sale in months as it holdings fell to 69,800 ETH.