Harvard Management Company Offloads $87M Ethereum ETF After One Quarter

Harvard Management Company, which runs Harvard University's endowment, sold its entire iShares Ethereum Trust position from BlackRock after holding it for one quarter. An SEC 13F filing for Q1 2026 shows the $87 million stake held at the end of 2025 no longer appears in the portfolio. Its Bitcoin ETF position was trimmed but not closed.

What the 13F Filing Shows

The 13F form is a mandatory quarterly disclosure for institutional managers with over $100 million in assets under management. It shows exactly which stocks and ETFs a fund holds at each quarter-end. Per Harvard Management Company's Q1 2026 filing, the iShares Ethereum Trust from BlackRock is absent from its holdings.

At the end of Q4 2025, the fund held that ETF at $87 million. Sales happened during the first quarter of 2026, when the price of Ethereum dropped below $2,200 and hit its lowest level since late 2024. Harvard's endowment manages assets exceeding $50 billion, placing it among the largest university funds in the United States.

Exiting Ethereum ETF after a single quarter signals the fund chose to take losses rather than wait for a recovery. The decision came as ETH had already lost more than half its value from its August 2025 peak.

Bitcoin ETF Stays at $117 Million

Harvard has not exited crypto entirely. The fund cut its iShares Bitcoin Trust position by 2.3 million shares but still holds more than 3 million shares of the ETF. Their market value at the end of Q1 2026 was roughly $117 million.

Other university endowments are taking different paths. Dartmouth College recently opened a Solana ETF position and holds about $14 million in crypto assets in total. The divergence reflects a broader lack of consensus among institutional endowments about which digital assets to hold in a prolonged bear market.

ETH Down Over 50% From Its August 2025 Record

Ethereum hit an all-time high above $5,000 in August 2025. By the end of Q1 2026, it had lost more than half that value. In May 2026, ETH trades around $2,100-2,200, back to levels last seen in late 2024.

Institutions that bought Ethereum ETFs in Q3 and Q4 2025 were sitting on double-digit paper losses by early 2026. Net outflows from Ethereum ETFs picked up across the market in Q1. Harvard moved out during that same window, locking in losses rather than waiting for a rebound.

Ethereum Foundation Sees Eight Departures in 2026

The portfolio shift came as Ethereum Foundation was dealing with its own personnel shakeup. Eight people have left the organization so far in 2026. Among them are researchers Julian Ma and Carl Beek and Josh Stark, a longtime researcher and former project manager who departed in April. Departures have been ongoing since early 2025, when the Foundation announced organizational changes.

In March 2026, the Ethereum Foundation published a mandate focusing on decentralization, privacy, and open-source principles. Community reaction was mixed.

"The Ethereum Foundation seems to want to sit back on its laurels and act above it all when all its competitors are all getting down and dirty on the field to gain market share."

- Laura Shin, journalist, from social media post

Harvard Management Company's full exit from Ethereum ETF in a single quarter adds to a pattern in 2026. Large endowments are keeping Bitcoin as their core crypto holding, while Ethereum is being treated as the higher-risk position for now.