Strategy shares fell 9.56% on Friday, the first full U.S. session after MSCI adopted rules that put the company at risk of index removal. Bitcoin lost far less, and miners fell about as hard, which complicates blaming MSCI alone. MSCI publishes its final list of affected companies on Nov. 11.
Strategy shares fell 9.56% to $136.83 on Friday, Oct. 16, in the first full U.S. trading session after MSCI adopted index-eligibility rules that put the bitcoin treasury company at risk of removal from its Global Investable Market Indexes.
The drop from Thursday's $151.29 close far exceeded bitcoin's loss over the same window. Bitcoin fell 0.98%, from about $82,309 to $81,506, according to The Defiant's calculation using CoinGecko data.
Miners and the Nasdaq fall too
The selloff extended beyond Strategy. The Nasdaq Composite fell 2.14%, while bitcoin miner MARA Holdings lost 9.60%, according to Yahoo Finance data cited by The Defiant. The Defiant said those declines complicate attributing Strategy's entire drop to the MSCI decision.
Bitcoin.com News reported that Riot Platforms slid 11.5% to $13.72, while Coinbase dropped 5.8%. Metaplanet, which MSCI's simulation also flagged, rose 4.5% in the same session.
Bitcoin holdings sit about $5.1 billion above cost
Strategy disclosed in an SEC filing that it held 848,250 BTC as of Oct. 11, bought for $64 billion at an average of $75,444 per coin. At bitcoin's Friday stock-market-close price, that holding was worth about $69.14 billion, or roughly $5.1 billion above purchase cost, according to The Defiant's calculation.
However, the gain does not remove the separate risk to demand for Strategy's shares from index-tracking funds. Strategy said funds linked to MSCI's GIMI held approximately 13 million shares, or 3.1% of its basic shares outstanding.
MSCI's final list is due Nov. 11
MSCI's Oct. 15 announcement adopted rules excluding non-operating companies from its indexes. A simulation using May 2026 data flagged Strategy for deletion, but that was not a final removal decision.
Bitcoin.com News reported that JPMorgan has estimated Strategy could face about $2.8 billion in passive outflows if it is removed.
MSCI will publish its final affected-company list on Nov. 11, and the new methodology takes effect at the close of Nov. 30.
Sources: The Defiant, Bitcoin News
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