Mutual-fund giant Capital Group is known for a disciplined approach. One of its top portfolio managers can’t get enough bitcoin. Capital Group is a 94-year-old mutual-fund juggernaut known for its disciplined investing style. Mark Casey, a portfolio manager with 25 years of experience at the firm, quotes pioneering value-investor Benjamin Graham and says his “approach is very informed by Warren Buffett.”

That is why it is so surprising that Capital Group has placed a huge bet on bitcoin—one of the largest by a mainstream investment firm—and that Casey has emerged as one of most outspoken backers of the digital currency in the so-called TradFi world.

“I just love bitcoin, I just think it is so interesting,” Casey, 54, said on a podcast interview hosted by venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz last year, calling it “one of the coolest things that has ever been created by people.”

In 2021, Capital Group spent over $500 million to buy a 12.3% stake in Strategy. That made the firm Strategy’s second-largest holder after Saylor, its founder. The mutual fund’s stake—which has shrunk to 7.89% after some sales but mostly because the company issued new shares—is now valued at $6.2 billion after a more than 2,248% surge of the stock over the past five years.