ARK Invest Builds $10M-Plus Position in 3iQ's Solana Staking ETF Across ARKW and ARKF

ARK Invest added 5,844 units of the 3iQ Solana Staking ETF (TSX: SOLQ.U) across its ARK Next Generation Internet ETF (ARKW) and ARK Fintech Innovation ETF (ARKF) on August 21, according to ARK's voluntary daily trade disclosure as reported by CryptoTimes. Four days earlier, on August 17, the same two funds purchased a combined 7,115 units (3,830 through ARKW and 3,285 through ARKF), per disclosures reported by TradingView. Together, the two purchases push ARK's cumulative position in SOLQ past $10 million, according to a 3iQ press release.

ARK publishes its holdings activity voluntarily each day, giving public visibility into position changes that most fund managers disclose only quarterly.

What 3iQ SOLQ.U Is and Why the Staking Structure Matters

The 3iQ Solana Staking ETF trades on the Toronto Stock Exchange in both CAD units (SOLQ) and USD units (SOLQ.U). It holds Solana (SOL) directly and distributes staking rewards to investors, delivering both price exposure and yield from Solana's proof-of-stake consensus.

That combination is not currently available in U.S.-listed Solana spot ETFs, where regulatory guidance on staking distributions inside the ETF wrapper remains unresolved. SOLQ.U is also a distinct product from Bitwise's U.S.-listed BSOL. For a U.S.-domiciled fund manager seeking Solana staking yield inside a regulated product, the Canadian-listed structure is presently the available route.

The fund launched April 16, 2025, carried a 0% management fee for its first 12 months, and holds over $120 million CAD in assets under management, according to 3iQ. The firm describes it as the largest Solana ETF by assets.

Cathie Wood's Stated Rationale

Wood's framing positions the SOLQ position as network exposure rather than a price trade on SOL. The staking mechanism ties the fund's performance directly to Solana's validator economics: staking rewards are a function of the protocol's inflation schedule and the transaction fees validators collect when processing blocks.

A Template Established in August 2024

ARK applied the same approach to Ethereum before Solana. In August 2024, ARKW and ARKF entered the 3iQ Ether Staking ETF (ETHQ.U), making them among the first U.S.-listed ETFs to hold Ethereum staking exposure through a regulated product. When SOLQ launched in April 2025, ARK established an initial position, and according to 3iQ, ARKW and ARKF became the first U.S.-listed ETFs to gain Solana staking exposure.

The August 17 and August 21 purchases are additions to that existing position, not a fresh entry. The two buys in a single week signal deliberate accumulation rather than a one-time move.

August 21: SOLQ.U Among a Cluster of Crypto-Linked Purchases

The 5,844-unit SOLQ.U purchase was one of three crypto-adjacent additions ARK made on August 21, per the same daily disclosures. The firm also bought 205,031 shares of SpaceX (whose equity trades as a tokenized asset on Solana under the ticker SPCX) and added 189,796 shares of Securitize, the tokenization platform that joined NYSE trading in July 2026 following a SPAC merger. On the same session, ARK sold 156,000 Palantir shares.

The three crypto-linked additions together illustrate how ARK is building layered exposure to digital-asset infrastructure through regulated products rather than direct token holdings: a Canadian Solana staking ETF, a tokenization infrastructure company, and a firm whose own equity is tokenized on Solana.

3iQ Background: Lead Investor and Ownership

SkyBridge Capital anchored SOLQ's early capitalization with a $50 million lead investment at the April 2025 launch, according to 3iQ. Monex Group, a Japanese financial services firm that acquired a majority stake in 3iQ in 2024, owns the parent company. Pascal St-Jean serves as 3iQ's president and CEO.

The two August purchases, totaling 12,959 units across August 17 and August 21, represent the kind of sustained accumulation that distinguishes an active position from a static seed allocation.

The Compounding Case for Staking Yield

The total return difference between a Solana staking fund and a plain spot fund grows over time. Where a spot fund tracks price alone, a staking fund tracks price and earns network yield on the SOL it holds, with rewards denominated in SOL and reinvested into the fund's holdings.

The Solana network's staking yield draws from two sources: the protocol's inflation schedule, which distributes newly issued SOL proportionally to staked weight, and transaction fees collected by validators processing blocks. A fund holding and staking SOL earns its proportional share of both. Over a multi-year holding period, the gap between staking and spot total returns widens in proportion to the yield rate and the network's ongoing fee production.

Solana has expanded its institutional layer through 2026, with the network leading all blockchains in 30-day tokenized treasury inflows at $378.2 million as of mid-August, and the regulated products channeling capital into that layer have multiplied alongside it. ARK's SOLQ.U position, now above $10 million across ARKW and ARKF, reflects a TradFi fund manager choosing the version of Solana exposure that earns network yield alongside the price.