Paul Tudor Jones' firm increases BlackRock Bitcoin ETF stake by 19%

Paul Tudor Jones' macro hedge fund, Tudor Investment, increased its direct stake in BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF by 18.9% to 688,529 shares, worth $22.9 million as of June 30, 2026. This accumulation reverses a year-long selling trend throughout 2025, though the position remains 91.4% below its late-2024 peak. Simultaneously, the firm slashed its call options by 85.2% while keeping puts relatively flat at 715,000 underlying shares, indicating a heavily hedged posture amid renewed institutional interest in spot Bitcoin ETFs.

Tudor Investment IBIT stake increase

• ▪Tudor Investment increased its direct stake in BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF by 18.9% in the second quarter of 2026, adding 109,446 shares to reach a total of 688,529 shares.
• ▪Tudor Investment's direct stake of 688,529 shares in BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF remains 91.4% below its late-2024 peak of over 8 million shares, which was valued at $427 million.
• ▪The second-quarter 2026 increase in Tudor Investment's direct iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF stake reversed a year-long stretch of selling that occurred throughout 2025.
• ▪Tudor Investment's direct stake in BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF was valued at approximately $22.9 million as of June 30, 2026.

Options positioning shift

• ▪Tudor Investment's put options tied to the iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF declined by 1.4% in the second quarter of 2026 to 715,000 underlying shares, outnumbering its call options by nearly five to one.
• ▪Tudor Investment cut its reported call options tied to the iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF by 85.2% in the second quarter of 2026, reducing the position to 148,000 underlying shares from 998,000 shares.

Bitcoin as inflation hedge thesis

• ▪Paul Tudor Jones reiterated his support for Bitcoin in April 2026, calling it the best inflation hedge due to its fixed supply advantage over gold.
• ▪Billionaire investor Paul Tudor Jones first publicly endorsed Bitcoin as an inflation hedge in May 2020, comparing it to gold in the 1970s and calling it a bet against currency debasement.

Institutional Bitcoin ETF adoption trends

• ▪BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF continues to dominate the U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF category, commanding approximately 49% of the market's total assets.
• ▪U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs drew hundreds of millions of dollars in inflows over a five-day span in August 2026 as market expectations for interest-rate hikes cooled.

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