Stanford’s Blyth Fund allocates 7% of its portfolio to Bitcoin

Mar 5, 202405:38 UTC

An investment fund that manages a portion of Stanford University’s expendable funds pool has as much as 7% of its portfolio dedicated to Bitcoin BTCUSD investments.

On March 5, computer science major and leader at the Stanford Blockchain Club Kole Lee announced that the university’s student-run Blyth Fund allocated around 7% of the portfolio to BTC following his pitch to the fund in February.

The fund "has bought Bitcoin at $45,000," he said before adding that he pitched BlackRock’s IBIT exchange-traded fund (ETF) to the Blyth Fund.

His arguments, “which tried to remain as objectively bullish as possible while catering to an audience of skeptics,” revolved around three key factors: ETF inflows, crypto market cycles and a hedge against “monetary chaos and war,” he said.

The student-led fund, established in 1978 in honor of legendary banker Charles Blyth, manages a six-figure portion of Stanford’s Expendable Funds Pool by investing in stocks, bonds and other assets, which now include BTC.

Lee told Cointelegraph that the Blyth Fund is a student-run investment club “committed to their members investing within their skill sets and passions” before adding:

“The Blyth Funds are separately managed funds that are part of the expandable fund pool and give discretion in investing decisions to students. Thus, I thought the ETF was a wonderful opportunity for Blyth to buy Bitcoin.”

Lee speculated that when the all-time high of $69,000 is broken, “billions of shorts will be covered, and people will become excited at ATHs, enhancing a volatile move to the upside.”

BlackRock wants BTC exposure in $36.5B high-yield fund

Meanwhile, asset manager BlackRock filed an amendment with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission on March 4 to incorporate Bitcoin exposure in its Strategic Income Opportunities Fund (BSIIX).

It stated that it may purchase shares in funds that have direct exposure to the price of BTC.

“The Fund may acquire shares in exchange-traded products (“ETPs”) that seek to reflect generally the performance of the price of Bitcoin by directly holding Bitcoin (“Bitcoin ETPs”), including shares of a Bitcoin ETP sponsored by an affiliate of BlackRock.”

The fixed-income SIO fund currently has $36.5 billion in assets under management, according to BlackRock.

The firm’s recently launched spot Bitcoin ETF, IBIT, is the best-performing of the newly launched batch of 10 funds. This week, it surpassed $11 billion in assets under management and had an inflow of $420 million on March 4.

This article was corrected on March 6 to reflect that the Blyth Fund is not part of the Stanford Endowment but part of the Expendable Funds Pool for Stanford.