Overview
- Intesa Sanpaolo disclosed roughly $231 million in crypto-linked positions for Q1 2026, a small slice of its roughly €930 billion balance sheet.
- The bank opened first-time stakes in Ether and XRP by buying 3,147,918 shares of BlackRock’s iShares Staked Ethereum Trust and 712,319 shares of Grayscale’s XRP Trust, which was worth about $18 million on March 31.
- Bitcoin exposure rose through added shares of the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF and BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust, and the bank initiated call options tied to the iShares fund.
- Solana exposure was largely unwound as holdings in the Bitwise Solana Staking ETF fell from 266,320 shares to 2,817 during the quarter.
- Intesa said the positions are for proprietary trading, while outside reporting ties the activity to custody and tokenization work, with Ripple saying in April it offered the bank institutional custody support.