For the third consecutive quarter, public companies are buying Bitcoin at a faster rate than Wall Street’s popular Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs). This signals a significant shift in how institutions are gaining exposure to cryptocurrencies. In the second quarter, corporate treasuries scooped up about 131,000 coins, while ETFs added around 111,000.
This trend follows the “MicroStrategy playbook,” where businesses add Bitcoin to their balance sheets to increase their value and attract investors. By holding Bitcoin, these companies become a proxy for the cryptocurrency itself. According to analysts, these companies aren’t just reacting to market prices; they are continuously buying to grow their Bitcoin holdings and look more attractive to shareholders.
While ETFs still hold more Bitcoin overall—over 1.4 million coins compared to companies’ 855,000—the faster pace of corporate buying is significant. A more crypto-friendly regulatory environment has boosted the trend.
More companies are joining in, including GameStop, which recently approved Bitcoin as a treasury asset. Still, MicroStrategy (recently rebranded as Strategy) remains the dominant player in the space.
So, why would an investor buy stock in these companies instead of just buying Bitcoin? According to experts, it’s a way to get leveraged exposure. These companies can utilize capital markets to raise capital and purchase additional Bitcoin on behalf of investors, a task that an individual cannot easily accomplish. This presents an opportunity to potentially outperform Bitcoin’s gains, offering these stocks a unique value proposition for investors in the digital asset.
