Bitcoin holdings of Saylor’s Strategy swell to over $70 billion

The former MicroStrategy Inc. bought 4,225 Bitcoin tokens for $472 million at an average price of $111,827 during the seven days ended July 13, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday.

The purchase, the latest in a series of almost weekly acquisitions of the cryptocurrency, increased the Tysons Corner, Virginia-based firm’s holdings of the digital asset to around $73 billion, or around 2.8% of all the 21 million tokens that will ever be minted. Strategy is the largest corporate owner of Bitcoin and boasts a market capitalization of more than $121 billion.

Strategy recently pivoted from selling common shares and has been marketing three different offerings of preferred shares through its at-the-market program to fund its Bitcoin purchases. The company raised $472 million from last week’s sale of these products, with the majority of it going toward its Bitcoin haul. The stock-like products are able to be traded forever and produce dividends.

Saylor’s company is set to register a multi-billion dollar quarterly profit when it reports earnings next month due to a rebound in the price of Bitcoin and a fairly recent accounting change related to valuing its massive holdings of the cryptocurrency. This quarter, the company has spent $7.24 billion on Bitcoin over 13 separate purchases, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Strategy’s shares have soared over 3,300% since Saylor began buying Bitcoin in the middle of 2020 as a hedge against inflation. Bitcoin is up more than 1,000% during the same period, while the S&P 500 has increased around 115%. The original cryptocurrency hit an all-time high of $123,000 before paring back gains on Monday. It is now trading at $121,696 as of 10:11 am in New York.