Italy's largest financial institution, Intesa Sanpaolo, more than doubled its crypto asset portfolio in the first quarter of 2026. The value of crypto assets held by the bank rose from $100 million at the end of 2025 to $235 million as of March 31 of this year. This is reported by Cointelegraph.com reports .
The growth was primarily driven by the expansion of Bitcoin positions. The bank increased its investments in the ARK 21Shares BTC ETF and BlackRock's iShares Bitcoin Trust ETF. It also entered the Ethereum market for the first time by purchasing BlackRock's iShares Staked Ethereum Trust and acquired a $26 million stake in XRP through the Grayscale XRP Trust ETF.
Intesa Sanpaolo shifted its strategy, significantly reducing its Solana assets and selling almost its entire stake in the Bitwise Solana Staking ETF. Meanwhile, the bank increased its Coinbase holdings from 1,500 to 10,357 shares and added 165,600 shares of BitGo to its portfolio for the first time.
These moves indicate the bank's strengthening ties in the digital asset sector. Last month, Ripple announced that it would provide custody services to the Intesa Sanpaolo banking group. Bank management stated that these crypto assets are primarily held for private trading purposes.
Other major European banks are also actively entering the crypto market. For instance, Spain's BBVA, France's BPCE, and Belgium's KBC offer cryptocurrency trading services to clients. Additionally, major financial institutions like BNP Paribas and Deutsche Bank are working on a euro-backed stablecoin project that complies with MiCA regulations.
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