Author: Nancy, PANews
Today, it's no longer surprising to see Wall Street giants entering the crypto space. The presence of mainstream institutions is becoming increasingly clear in crypto sectors such as ETFs, RWA, and derivatives. The market's real concern has long since shifted from whether to enter the market to how to position themselves.
Recently, Goldman Sachs disclosed its massive $2.3 billion crypto allocation. Although this is still a "small position" in its overall asset portfolio and has significantly decreased compared to before, its holding structure is quite significant. Despite a large difference in market capitalization, Goldman Sachs maintains a nearly equal exposure to BTC and ETH.
This detail may be more signaling than the size of the holding itself.
Goldman Sachs casts a vote of confidence in ETH, positioning it on par with BTC. Amidst continued pressure on Ethereum prices and a significant cooling of market sentiment, Goldman Sachs' latest disclosed portfolio structure sends a signal different from market sentiment. According to its 13F filings, as of Q4 2025, Goldman Sachs indirectly held approximately $2.361 billion in crypto assets through ETFs. This allocation is not significant within its overall portfolio. During the same period, Goldman Sachs' overall investment portfolio reached $811.1 billion, with crypto asset exposure accounting for only about 0.3%. For traditional financial giants managing hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars, this proportion can only be considered a trial. From the perspective of mainstream players, crypto remains an alternative asset, not a core holding. Small-scale participation satisfies client needs, maintains market participation, and allows for strict risk control in a volatile environment. What truly deserves attention is not the scale, but the portfolio structure and direction. In the fourth quarter of last year, the crypto market experienced a general correction, and spot ETFs also saw significant net outflows. Goldman Sachs also reduced its positions accordingly, with its Bitcoin spot ETF and Ethereum spot ETF holdings decreasing by 39.4% and 27.2% respectively quarter-on-quarter. At the same time, it established new positions in the XRP ETF and Solana ETF during the quarter, beginning a small foray into second-tier assets. As of the end of the quarter, Goldman Sachs held approximately 21.2 million shares of the Bitcoin ETF, with a market value of approximately $1.06 billion; approximately 40.7 million shares of the Ethereum ETF, with a market value of approximately $1 billion; and approximately $152 million in XRP ETF and $109 million in Solana ETF. In other words, nearly 90% of its crypto exposure remains concentrated in the two core assets, BTC and ETH. Compared to some aggressive asset management firms or crypto-native funds, Goldman Sachs' strategy is clearly more conservative, with liquidity, compliance, and institutional acceptance remaining its primary allocation priorities. However, what is even more significant is the almost equal weighting of BTC and ETH. Currently, Bitcoin's market capitalization is approximately 5.7 times that of Ethereum, yet Goldman Sachs has not weighted its allocation by market capitalization, instead placing ETH and BTC on roughly equal footing. This means that Ethereum has been elevated to the second strategic level of crypto assets within its asset framework. Moreover, during the Q4 2025 reduction, the ETH position decreased by 12% less than the BTC position. To some extent, this is an overweight vote of confidence. This preference is not a spur-of-the-moment decision. Over the past few years, Goldman Sachs has continuously invested in various businesses, including asset tokenization, derivatives structuring infrastructure, and OTC trading, most of which are highly relevant to the Ethereum ecosystem. In fact, several years ago, Goldman Sachs research publicly predicted that ETH's market capitalization could surpass BTC's in the next few years, citing its network effects and ecosystem application advantages as a native smart contract platform. This judgment remains valid. In its "Global Macro Research" report last year, Goldman Sachs reiterated that, considering real-world use, user base, and technological iteration speed, Ethereum has the potential to become the core carrier of mainstream crypto assets. Despite the recent divergence between Ethereum's price and fundamentals, Goldman Sachs maintains a relatively positive outlook. They point out that Ethereum's on-chain activity paints a different picture, with daily new addresses reaching 427,000 in January, a record high, far exceeding the daily average of 162,000 addresses during the DeFi summer of 2020. Simultaneously, daily active addresses reached 1.2 million, also a record high. Perhaps, in the asset logic of Wall Street institutions, Bitcoin has become a macro hedging tool, while Ethereum carries the structural narrative of on-chain finance and application ecosystems. The two represent different dimensions of allocation logic; the former leans towards value storage, while the latter bets on infrastructure and network effects. Goldman Sachs's Turnaround, Wall Street's Hesitation and Entry Goldman Sachs is also a "latecomer" to the crypto market. If we extend the timeline, this typical traditional financial institution's entry into the market wasn't aggressive; it adopted a "compliance-first, gradual trial" approach. As early as 2015, Goldman Sachs filed a patent application for a securities settlement system based on SETLcoin, attempting to explore using blockchain-like technology to optimize the clearing process. At that time, Bitcoin hadn't yet entered the mainstream; this was more of a technological interest than an asset-level recognition. In 2017, when Bitcoin prices soared to historical highs, Goldman Sachs planned to establish a crypto trading desk to provide Bitcoin-related services; in 2018, it hired former crypto traders to prepare a Bitcoin trading platform. At that time, Goldman Sachs had already begun to directly engage with this emerging market. However, the real turning point came in 2020. That year, Goldman Sachs explicitly stated in a client conference call that Bitcoin couldn't even be considered an asset class, as it neither generates cash flow nor effectively hedges against inflation. This public bearish stance sparked considerable controversy in the market. A year later, Goldman Sachs' stance quickly softened. In 2021, amid rising demand from institutional clients, Goldman Sachs relaunched its cryptocurrency trading division, began trading Bitcoin-related derivatives, and partnered with Galaxy Digital to launch Bitcoin futures trading products. In 2022, Goldman Sachs completed its first crypto OTC transaction and expanded its digital asset team. By 2024, it had not only invested in multiple crypto companies but also officially entered the crypto spot ETF market. True, widespread acceptance has emerged in the last two years. In March 2025, Goldman Sachs mentioned cryptocurrencies for the first time in its annual shareholder letter, acknowledging increased competition in the industry and predicting that clearer regulations would drive a new wave of institutional adoption, with tokenization, DeFi, and stablecoins expected to grow under the impetus of new regulations. More recently, its CEO, David Solomon, publicly confirmed that the company is increasing its research and investment in tokenization, stablecoins, and prediction markets. This shift in strategy is not uncommon among traditional money market participants. For example, in 2025, Anthony Scaramucci, founder of Skybridge Capital, admitted that although he had been exposed to Bitcoin since 2012, it took him a full eight years to make his first Bitcoin investment because he initially didn't understand it and was full of skepticism. It wasn't until he truly studied blockchain and Bitcoin mechanisms that he realized it was a "great technological breakthrough." He even stated that with "doing some homework," 90% of people would be inclined towards Bitcoin. Today, Skybridge Capital holds a significant amount of Bitcoin and invests approximately 40% of its client funds in digital assets. Amid the recent bear market, Scaramucci revealed that the firm had been building positions in Bitcoin in batches at $84,000, $63,000, and the current range, describing buying Bitcoin in a downtrend as "like catching a falling knife," but remaining firmly bullish in the long term. These elite Wall Street investors always prioritize risk in their decision-making, typically choosing to scale up their investments only when the risk is manageable. Furthermore, the decision-making cycle of institutions also determines that the actual inflow of funds is a marathon. According to a recent interview with Matt Hougan, Chief Investment Officer of Bitwise, the next wave of potential buyers remains financial advisors, large brokerages like Morgan Stanley, family offices, insurance companies, and sovereign nations. Bitwise's average client goes through eight meetings before allocating assets. We typically meet once a quarter, so "eight meetings" means a decision-making cycle of up to two years. Morgan Stanley didn't approve a Bitcoin ETF until the fourth quarter of 2025; their "eight-meeting alarm" has only just begun, and the real inflow of funds may not explode until 2027. This is similar to the launch of gold ETFs in 2004, where inflows increased year by year, taking a full eight years to reach the first peak. Most funds managed by professional investors do not currently hold Bitcoin. The transition of crypto assets from fringe to mainstream assets is inherently a slow and tortuous process. When former bears begin to hold their positions compliantly, and when skeptics transform into long-term allocators, the real change in the crypto market may not lie in price movements, but in the upgrading of the participant structure.
