Strive, a United States investment company, bought 469 bitcoins last week for $36.6 million, at an average price of about $78,000 per coin. The purchase brings the firm's crypto reserve to exactly 25,000 BTC, now worth roughly $1.95 billion.
Strive chief executive Matt Cole said that 100% of the capital used for the purchase came from the issuance of perpetual preferred shares known as SATA. The face value of those securities now exceeds $1 billion, he said.
Strive is one of a growing number of publicly traded firms that have adopted corporate bitcoin treasury strategies in recent years, a model pioneered by Strategy, the company formerly known as MicroStrategy and led by Michael Saylor, which holds large amounts of bitcoin on its balance sheet rather than cash.
Strive's ranking among corporate bitcoin holders
Strive ranks fifth among publicly traded companies holding bitcoin, behind Strategy, Twenty One Capital, Metaplanet and MARA Holdings, according to data from Bitcoin Treasuries, a site that tracks corporate crypto holdings.
The company has recently slowed its buying pace. A week earlier, Strive purchased 1,375 BTC, but over the most recent seven days it bought only 469 coins.
To overtake Twenty One Capital, Strive would need to buy 18,515 more BTC. With 15 full seven-day periods remaining before the end of the year, the company could still pass its rival if it purchased about 1,234 BTC per week.
Bitcoin's price and Cole's outlook
Bitcoin currently trades above $78,800, up 1.1% over the past 24 hours. It has climbed almost 22% over the past month, though it remains 39% below its all-time high of $126,198, reached in October last year.
Cole recently suggested that the next bitcoin growth cycle could be the strongest in the cryptocurrency's history. He named the weakening US dollar and the growth of artificial intelligence as the main factors he expects to drive bitcoin higher.
