The state of Michigan has bought Bitcoin for its pension fund

Another regional government has revealed an allocation to newly launched Bitcoin ETFs, taking another step in the growing adoption of Bitcoin not only among institutions but also among governments.

In a Form 13F filed on Friday, the State of Michigan Retirement System disclosed that it had $6.6 million allocated to Bitcoin ETF products as of June 30.

Michigan buys Bitcoin

According to the filing, the pension fund made its first investment in Bitcoin through the Ark 21Shares Bitcoin ETF, the fourth largest US Bitcoin ETF behind BlackRock, Grayscale and Fidelity.

The $6 billion investment is just a drop in the ocean compared to the pension’s $143.9 billion in assets as of December 2023, which is a 0.004% slice of the total pie. For each Michigan citizen, that represents just $0.71 of BTC.

“As someone from Michigan… boo yah for being ahead of the curve,” Blockware podcast boss Luke Broyles tweeted on Friday. “They’ve dropped zero.”

Michigan is now the second US state to confirm that it is “at zero” after Wisconsin. In May, the State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB) disclosed that it had deployed $154 million in BlackRock and Grayscale Bitcoin ETFs as of March 31, a 0.4% share of its stock portfolio of $37.8 billion.

Pensions Buying BTC

Jersey City is also getting into Bitcoin, with Mayor Steven Fulop announcing Thursday that he is filing with regulators to allow investment in Bitcoin ETFs.

“The question of whether Crypto/Bitcoin is here to stay is largely over + crypto/Bitcoin won”, Fullop he tweeted Friday. The city allocation will be completed by the end of the summer, with the intention of allocating approximately 2% of the fund’s assets to BTC.

Interest in Bitcoin is already increasing in other states, as many have now passed legislation to guarantee citizens’ rights to Bitcoin custody. Ohio state Rep. Steve Demetriou proposed such legislation in April, which would also require state pensions to evaluate the Bitcoin ETF for potential investment.

While the Bitcoin allocations of most large investors still seem small, Bitwise CIO Matt Hougan has stated that BTC allocations tend to increase over time, after investors first get into the water

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