MSCI adopts rules that could oust Strategy from indexes

Index provider MSCI said on Oct. 15 that it will treat non-operating companies as ineligible for its Global Investable Market Indexes, a decision that could push Strategy and other crypto treasury firms out of benchmarks tracked by index funds worldwide.

The change implements a proposal from a consultation announced Aug. 3, with minor modifications, MSCI said in its announcement. It takes effect with the November 2026 Index Review as of the close of Nov. 30, 2026. Alongside investment funds, business development companies and other passive vehicles that are already ineligible, the category will now cover corporate issuers with similar characteristics picked up by new quantitative screens.

A company will first face a core screen testing whether it holds substantial operating assets. Issuers that fail that screen then face an exclusion screen built on five non-industry-specific financial ratios, and a security will be ineligible if it trips four or more of the five, the announcement said. To limit turnover, current index members will be removed only if they fail the screen in each of their two most recent annual filing periods, while non-members will be kept out if they fail in either of the two. MSCI may also use the most recent interim filing where available.

The final list of affected companies will be published Nov. 11 as part of the November review announcement, with a preliminary list of potentially impacted constituents posted at MSCI's consultation page, the provider said. At the same time, MSCI will drop interim measures dating to Oct. 10, 2025 that froze share counts and inclusion factors for companies whose digital asset holdings reached 50 percent or more of total assets. Those companies will now be judged under the new methodology instead.

Strategy, Metaplanet and Upexi could be removed under the new rules, Cointelegraph reported. MSCI had previously named Strategy among the companies that would be deleted under the non-operating methodology, and SharpLink, Ton Strategy Company, Solana Company and DeFi Development Corp. sit on a watchlist for potential removal, according to the same report. An earlier simulation had flagged Strategy, Metaplanet and uranium holder Yellow Cake, with SharpLink as a possible watchlist name, BeInCrypto wrote. None of these names appears in the Oct. 15 announcement itself, so they stand as outlet-reported expectations ahead of the Nov. 11 list, not confirmed removals.

The buffers apply in both directions. A non-member stays out if it fails the screen in either of its two most recent annual filing periods, while a current member leaves only after failing in each of the two, with MSCI able to use the most recent interim filing where available, the provider said. The methodology also ends the interim regime for companies with large digital-asset holdings. The freeze on share counts and inclusion-factor increases, and the deferral of additions and size-segment moves, all fall away with the November review. MSCI framed the buffers as a way to reduce index turnover, and a preliminary list of potentially impacted members sits on its consultation page until the final Nov. 11 list.

Removal would matter because funds tracking MSCI indexes would generally have to sell the affected shares when they rebalance, putting pressure on prices and cutting passive demand. "It removes a company from the default portfolios of tens of millions of people who never chose to remove it," Conner Brown, executive director of the Bitcoin Policy Institute, said in September about broad-market index exclusion, in comments cited by Cointelegraph.

JPMorgan analysts had previously estimated that Strategy's exclusion could trigger about $2.8 billion in selling, though that figure concerned MSCI's earlier digital asset proposal rather than the rules adopted Thursday, the report noted. Strategy sought to play down the impact in August, saying funds tracking MSCI's indexes hold about 13 million of its shares, or 3.1 percent of basic shares outstanding, which it described as less than a typical day of trading volume. "We believe the proposal is misguided," the company said in its response to MSCI, BeInCrypto wrote.

The market reaction came before the news. MSTR rose 5.62 percent on Thursday to close at $151.29, but that rally happened before MSCI published its decision after the US market closed, according to the BeInCrypto report. Exclusion would not delist MSTR from Nasdaq and would not require Strategy to sell any bitcoin. MSCI will publish its affected-company list on Nov. 11, with the rules taking effect after Nov. 30 and existing members protected by the two-filing test before removal.