Key takeaways:
- Strategy currently holds over 815,000 BTC, which is approximately 4% of the total Bitcoin supply.
- The company’s business model has evolved from data analytics to an “issuer of capital for the purchase of digital assets”, which allows stock investors to have indirect exposure to cryptocurrencies.
- Michael Saylor’s actions had the impact of creating new accounting standards and risk assessment models for digital assets on the balance sheets of public companies.
The American company Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) currently controls 815,061 BTC, worth over $64 billion. It is no longer just a software company, but the world’s largest corporate holder of Bitcoin, which over the last five years has acquired almost a significant portion of all coins that will ever be in circulation. Michael Saylor’s aggressive accumulation policy transformed the MSTR stock ticker into a kind of leveraged ETF that became the foundation of the current bull market and a magnet for Wall Street institutional capital.
Michael Saylor’s Engineering Foundation
Michael Saylor, born in 1965 in Nebraska, is a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he graduated with honors in aeronautics and astronautics and history of science. His military upbringing on U.S. Air Force bases gave him a rigorous approach to systems and logistics. Instead of a career as a military pilot, which was prevented by health concerns, Saylor focused on computer simulations, which led to the founding of MicroStrategy in 1989. For three decades, he built the company’s position as a leader in business analytics, but it was the 2020 crisis that triggered the need to find a digital solution for depreciating capital. Saylor views Bitcoin through the prism of the laws of physics – as a system for transporting economic energy in time and space.
Financial engineering
Michael Saylor doesn’t buy Bitcoin with surplus employee wages. It exploits loopholes in the traditional financial system to turn low-interest debt into “digital gold.” Strategy regularly issues bonds convertible into shares, raising billions of dollars from investors who willingly finance cryptocurrency purchases in exchange for a share in the company’s potential growth.
This is classic arbitration. The company borrows dollars that lose value due to inflation and uses them to buy an asset with a limited supply.
Strategy’s resources grew by leaps and bounds. In May 2025, the company had 580,250 BTC. A year later, in April 2026, the counter already shows 815,061 BTC. The average purchase price is currently approximately $66,357 per unit. With the current rate hovering around $79,000, the company’s unrealized profit is in the tens of billions of dollars.
Why do investors choose Strategy over Bitcoin itself?
Investing in Stocks Strategy offers something that Bitcoin alone does not: operational leverage. Due to the fact that the company finances purchases with debt, a 10% increase in the value of Bitcoin often translates into a much higher increase in the company’s share price. For pension funds and large institutions that are legally restricted from directly purchasing cryptocurrencies on exchanges such as Binance or Coinbase, Strategy is the easiest way to enter the crypto market through the regulated NASDAQ exchange.
Investors look at the “Bitcoin Yield” indicator. This is a proprietary metric introduced by Saylor that measures the ratio of Bitcoins held to the number of shares issued. The goal is simple: increase the amount of BTC per share, even if this means diluting shareholders through new issues.
Can Strategy influence Bitcoin itself?
Accounting regulations and standards
Strategy’s activities forced regulators to act. For years, US accounting standards (GAAP) penalized companies for holding cryptocurrencies – companies had to report declines in the value of assets (write-offs), but could not show increases in their value until the sale. Strategy played a major role in lobbying for changes to the FASB (Financial Accounting Standards Board). The new regulations allow Bitcoin to be valued at fair value, which makes the financial reports of companies exposed to cryptocurrencies finally clear and reflect the real assets.
Saylor transformed Strategy into a learning center for other corporations. During the “Bitcoin for Corporations” conference, the company’s management provides ready-made legal documents, treasury policies and risk assessment models. Companies such as Tesla, Block (formerly Square) and numerous funds from Japan and Europe have already followed in Strategy’s footsteps, treating Bitcoin as a strategic capital reserve.
The risk remains obvious: huge exposure to volatility. With 815,000 coins owned, each decline in the Bitcoin price by $1,000 reduces the company’s balance sheet by nearly a billion dollars. However, Michael Saylor remains adamant that Bitcoin is “digital energy” and Strategy intends to buy it “forever.” The company currently has a cash reserve of more than $2 billion, ready to make further purchases during market corrections.
