UBS has increased its BlackRock Bitcoin ETF holding to about 2.5 million shares worth nearly $90 million as of June 30, lifting the position’s value by roughly 230% during the first half of 2026.
Summary
- UBS held about 2.5 million IBIT shares valued at nearly $90 million on June 30.
- The share count increased roughly 355% from about 549,000 at the end of 2025.
- A Form 13F does not identify whether UBS or its clients ultimately own the shares.
- BlackRock’s fund gives U.S. investors regulated Bitcoin exposure without direct crypto custody.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing, submitted by UBS on Aug. 13, disclosed the Swiss bank’s quarter-end position in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT). UBS reported about 2.5 million shares as of June 30, up from approximately 549,000 shares six months earlier.
Measured by share count, the position expanded by about 355%, with UBS adding nearly 2 million shares during the period. Its reported value increased from roughly $27 million at the end of 2025 to close to $90 million, a gain of about 230%.
The difference between the two rates partly comes from IBIT’s market performance. BlackRock’s fund data show its market-price return fell 32.95% during the six months through June 30, meaning the increase in the value reported by UBS came from additional shares rather than a rise in IBIT’s price.
What the UBS Bitcoin ETF filing shows
Form 13F requires institutional investment managers exercising discretion over at least $100 million in certain securities to report their holdings to the SEC every quarter. The reports cover positions held at the end of the period, which means UBS could have changed its IBIT exposure between June 30 and the Aug. 13 filing date.
A 13F also does not provide enough information to determine whether every reported share belongs to UBS itself. The filing combines securities managed under the institution’s investment discretion and may include positions held in client, advisory, wealth-management, or asset-management accounts.
As a result, the disclosure should not be treated automatically as a direct $90 million purchase made with the bank’s corporate capital. It confirms that UBS reported control over the IBIT shares for filing purposes, but it does not identify the beneficial owners or explain the investment instructions behind the position.
Even at nearly $90 million, the holding remains small beside the money UBS manages. In its second-quarter results published July 29, the bank reported a record $7.3 trillion in group invested assets, including $36 billion in net new assets at its Global Wealth Management division during the quarter and $73 billion during the first half.
UBS also reported $2.8 billion in net profit for the second quarter and $5.8 billion for the first six months of 2026. Against those figures, the IBIT position represents a limited allocation rather than evidence that Bitcoin has become a major part of the bank’s investment operations.
UBS has expanded regulated crypto access
While the filing does not reveal who directed the IBIT purchases, UBS has continued developing digital-asset services for wealthy customers. In January, crypto.news covered the bank’s plan to give select high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth private banking clients access to cryptocurrency investments.
The reported plan followed earlier limits around the bank’s handling of U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs. UBS had allowed certain wealth-management clients with brokerage accounts to buy the products after their U.S. approval, while applying eligibility and risk controls to access.
Using an exchange-traded product allows the bank and eligible clients to obtain Bitcoin-linked exposure through conventional securities infrastructure. BlackRock states that IBIT seeks to follow Bitcoin’s price while reducing the operational and custody work involved in holding the cryptocurrency directly.
IBIT trades on Nasdaq and charges a 0.25% sponsor fee. Unlike a conventional mutual fund or most ETFs, however, BlackRock says the trust is not registered as an investment company under the Investment Company Act of 1940 and therefore does not receive all the regulatory protections that apply to products registered under the law.
Although investors buy and sell IBIT shares through brokerage accounts, the trust holds Bitcoin as its single underlying asset. BlackRock reported that the fund had about $47.34 billion in net assets and 1.32 billion shares outstanding as of Aug. 12.
UBS’s reported 2.5 million shares would therefore account for about 0.19% of IBIT’s latest outstanding share count. The stake is too small to give UBS control over the fund, while the filing provides no evidence that the bank intends to become a direct Bitcoin custodian.
U.S. Bitcoin ETF access has grown
For American investors, the UBS filing shows how a foreign financial institution can gain exposure to Bitcoin through a security listed and traded in the United States. The SEC approved U.S. spot Bitcoin exchange-traded products in January 2024, creating a route for banks, asset managers, advisers, and brokerage customers to use familiar market infrastructure.
Institutional approaches to the products have varied. A July filing showed that Wells Fargo trimmed its IBIT stake while adding to some other Bitcoin funds and increasing its exposure to Ethereum and Solana investment products. The bank also opened an IBIT call position and increased its put exposure, showing that institutions can use the fund for hedging and trading as well as long-only Bitcoin exposure.
Regulated derivatives around IBIT have also expanded. In July, the SEC allowed NYSE Arca to quadruple its options limit from 250,000 to 1 million contracts after the exchange said trading activity justified a higher ceiling.
NYSE Arca told the regulator that the change would help large participants manage inventory and hedge positions without dividing trades because of exchange limits. The SEC allowed the proposal to take effect immediately while continuing to accept public comments.
Such options can help professional investors manage risk around IBIT, but BlackRock warns that the trust’s value can rise or fall with Bitcoin and that investors may lose principal. Fund data show IBIT returned negative 32.97% on a net asset value basis during the first half of 2026 and negative 45.62% over the 12 months through June 30.
IBIT remains the dominant U.S. Bitcoin fund
Despite its weak first-half performance, IBIT has continued to control a large part of the U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF market. BlackRock’s fund attracted $183.4 million on July 30, accounting for 78.7% of the $233.1 million entering the U.S. products that day.
At the time, IBIT held $47.67 billion in net assets, while the full group of U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs held about $78.76 billion, according to data cited in July ETF coverage. The July 30 inflow was the fund’s largest since July 6, when it received $209.4 million.
The daily recovery followed an uneven period for Bitcoin investment products. Farside Investors’ figures showed approximately $438.2 million in net inflows from July 1 through July 30 after the funds lost about $2.41 billion in May and $4.51 billion in June.
BlackRock reported an IBIT net asset value of $35.85 and net assets of $47.34 billion as of Aug. 12. The fund also listed a 52-week net asset value range of $33.19 to $71.32 and a 30-day average trading volume of about 35.7 million shares.
UBS must disclose its next quarter-end U.S. securities positions in a later 13F filing, which will show whether the reported IBIT share count was increased, maintained, or reduced as of Sept. 30.
