Saylor Passes BlackRock in Bitcoin, Tom Lee Clears 4% of Ether ($BTC, $ETH)

Strategy bought 34,164 Bitcoin for $2.54 billion at an average of $74,395 per coin, pushing holdings to 815,061 BTC and past BlackRock’s 802,823 as the largest institutional holder.

Two publicly traded treasuries moved roughly $2.77 billion into crypto in the past seven days. Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) disclosed in an 8-K filing Monday morning that it bought 34,164 Bitcoin between April 13 and April 19, spending $2.54 billion at an average of $74,395 per coin. BitMine Immersion Technologies separately disclosed a purchase of 101,627 Ether for about $235 million, its largest single-week buy of 2026.

The two buys landed in the same window where both assets traded well off their 2025 highs. Bitcoin changed hands near $75,300 on Monday and Ether near $2,318, according to Fortune’s spot pricing feed. The week’s activity made Michael Saylor’s Strategy the largest institutional holder of Bitcoin in the world, narrowly ahead of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust. It also brought Tom Lee’s BitMine within 88 basis points of its stated target of owning 5% of all circulating Ether.

Strategy’s Third-Largest Buy Ever

Strategy’s new total of 815,061 BTC was acquired for a cumulative $61.56 billion, or an average cost basis of $75,527 per coin. Saylor summarized the update on X Monday morning: “Strategy has acquired 34,164 BTC for ~$2.54 billion at ~$74,395 per bitcoin and has achieved BTC Yield of 9.5% YTD 2026.”

BTC Yield is Strategy’s proprietary performance metric (the percentage change in Bitcoin-per-diluted-share over a period, net of any equity dilution from share issuance). It is how the company measures whether its treasury strategy is creating per-share value or diluting it away.

The buy was financed through an at-the-market (ATM) equity program (a mechanism that lets public companies drip-sell new shares into the open market over time rather than through a single large offering). According to coverage by Bitcoin Magazine, roughly $366 million came from Class A common stock and $2.18 billion came from the company’s STRC perpetual preferred stock, which carries a fixed dividend and no conversion feature.

The milestone that mattered for markets was the overtake. BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust holds 802,823 BTC, according to CryptoBriefing’s reporting. Strategy’s new total puts it ahead of the ETF by roughly 12,000 coins and makes it the single largest institutional holder of Bitcoin in any form. Strategy now controls about 3.88% of Bitcoin’s fixed 21-million-coin supply.

BitMine’s Largest Week of 2026

BitMine’s 101,627-ETH buy lifted its treasury to 4,976,485 ETH, or roughly 4.12% of the total circulating Ether supply. The company first crossed 4% of supply on April 13. Chairman Tom Lee, who also runs research firm Fundstrat, framed the purchase as a directional call on where the cycle is now.

“We see growing signs that the ‘mini-crypto’ winter is coming to an end,” Lee said in the company’s announcement, per reporting from The Block. “As downside tail risks for the U.S.-Iran war diminish, ETH has risen 41% from its early February lows.”

On April 13, after the company’s treasury first crossed 4% of supply, Lee went further. “We believe ETH beating gold by 2,743 basis points demonstrates ETH is the wartime store of value,” he said, per CoinDesk coverage. Lee has cited two tailwinds for Ether specifically: Wall Street firms tokenizing financial assets on public blockchains, and agentic AI systems routing transactions through neutral settlement networks.

BitMine’s treasury is not idle. The company has staked 3.33 million ETH, or about 68% of its holdings, which it says produces roughly $212 million in annualized staking revenue. Staking (the process of locking up Ether to help validate transactions in exchange for a yield) gives BitMine a recurring cash line that Strategy’s Bitcoin treasury, by design, does not have.

What the Supply Math Actually Says

The supply picture differs sharply between the two assets. Bitcoin’s supply is capped at 21 million coins. Roughly 19.9 million of those have already been mined. Strategy’s 815,061 coins represent about 3.88% of total supply but closer to 4.1% of coins currently in circulation. Ether has no fixed cap, but its net issuance has been negative or near-zero since the 2022 shift to proof-of-stake. Circulating Ether is roughly 120.7 million. BitMine’s 4.98 million represents 4.12% of that.

Both companies are now large enough that their buys move the visible supply on exchanges. Bitcoin held on exchanges fell to multi-year lows earlier this month, according to CoinDesk’s market coverage. Ether held on exchanges has followed a similar trend. Every treasury purchase that moves into cold storage or staking is a coin that cannot be sold by a retail seller at a lower price.

That is the structural argument the two companies are making. Strategy and BitMine are not trading. They are reducing float. Whether the effect on price is durable depends on whether other buyers step in as supply tightens, or whether the treasuries themselves become the marginal bid that holds the floor.

What to Watch

Next 8-K cycle: Strategy has filed a buy 8-K roughly every 7 to 14 days this year. The next filing will show whether the current pace is a one-week push or a sustained accumulation. Watch for ATM offering capacity: the remaining room under the STRC program sets the ceiling on how much more Bitcoin the company can buy without issuing new equity.

BitMine’s 5% target: At 4.12%, BitMine needs roughly 1.07 million more ETH to hit its stated “alchemy of 5%” goal. At current prices that is about $2.5 billion of additional buying. The company’s next capital raise or preferred offering will signal how quickly management thinks it can close the gap.

ETF flow reversal: BlackRock‘s IBIT lost its title as the largest institutional Bitcoin holder this week. Net flows into spot Bitcoin ETFs will show whether passive retail demand can keep pace with corporate treasury buying, or whether the balance of marginal demand has permanently shifted from ETFs to operating-company balance sheets.