Tom Lee’s BitMine Adds $92 Million in Ethereum, Hits 4.7% of Total Supply

Publicly traded Ethereum treasury firm BitMine Immersion Technologies reached 4.7% of the circulating supply, adding another $92 million in ETH to its balance sheet last week. 

The firm bolstered its balance sheet with 52,203 ETH and now maintains 5,672,956 ETH valued around $10 billion and 205 Bitcoin worth around $13.3 million. 

“The best years for crypto remain ahead, in our view,” said Chairman Tom Lee in a statement. 

“Tokenization and the rapid progress in AI are expected to drive exponential demand growth for blockchain and decentralized crypto,” he added. (Disclaimer: Lee is an investor in Dastan, Decrypt’s parent company).

Its latest acquisition coincided with the start of trading for the firm’s dividend-paying preferred equity offering—BMNP, which began trading on the New York Stock Exchange last week. After opening at $85 per share, BMNP is recently changing hands at $88.34, up around 1.7% in early trading on Monday.

BitMine priced and completed the offering earlier this month, ultimately raising around $274 million in proceeds to help acquire more Ethereum and build out its staking infrastructure. Staking involves the pledging of assets to a blockchain network—in this case, Ethereum—in order to help validate transactions and secure the network. In exchange, users who stake their ETH receive newly minted ETH as rewards, ranging between 1.7% and 3.2% APY.

The preferred equity offering follows in the footsteps of Bitcoin behemoth Strategy, who similarly uses a dividend-paying preferred equity offering—STRC—to generate cash for additional Bitcoin purchases.

Strategy’s STRC has been under immense scrutiny of late, falling more than 10% from its par value of $100 per share, as investors showcase skepticism about how the firm will continue to fund dividend payments. 

Unlike Strategy though, BitMine may fund its dividend payments through its ETH staking income. As it stands, the firm now stakes more than 4.7 million ETH or around 83% of its total holdings via its Made in America Validator Network. 

When it completes the staking of its entire treasury, it projects around $268 million in revenue on an annualized basis, according to Lee. 

The price of Bitmine stock, which trades as BMNR, is up 0.4% on Monday, recently changing hands at $16.22. Meanwhile, Ethereum jumped 1.6% in the last 24 hours, trading around $1,752. 

Both remain significantly off their recent high marks, with BMNR nearly 90% off its 52-week high of $161 and ETH 64% off its August high of $4,946.