Strategy’s Return to Bitcoin Buying Lasted Exactly One Week

Strategy bought no Bitcoin in the week to September 7, a week after ending a two-month BTC purchasing drought, and spent $176.3 million buying back its own preferred stock instead, the Bitcoin treasury company said in a filing on Tuesday.

All of it went on STRC, the variable rate perpetual stretch preferred, at 1,810,885 shares. Strategy repurchased none of its STRF, STRK or STRD preferreds and none of its MSTR common stock, and funded the buying from its USD Cash pool.

Its board has doubled the authorization behind that spending, lifting the digital credit securities repurchase program from $1 billion to $2 billion. As of September 7, $1.19 billion of it remained available. A separate $1 billion program for MSTR stock is untouched.

Nothing added to the stack

The company bought and sold no Bitcoin over the period, and sold no shares under its at-the-market offering program either. It holds 845,050 BTC, bought for $63.73 billion at an average of $75,412 each including fees.

With Bitcoin trading around $77,760 at the time of writing, per CoinGecko data, Strategy’s stack is worth roughly $65.7 billion against the $63.7 billion paid, an unrealized gain of about 3%. Last week’s purchase, at $80,318 a coin, is under water.

Strategy’s dollar balances now stand at $5.10 billion in the USD Reserve, which covers preferred dividends and interest, and $1.44 billion in USD Cash, the pot management can deploy on Bitcoin or anything else. The $176.3 million of buybacks came out of the latter.

The company raised $2 billion selling MSTR stock in August and created the USD Cash pot with it, then bought $370 million of Bitcoin, its first purchase since June. Last week it bought none.

Strategy’s Chair Michael Saylor and CEO Phong Le meanwhile asked MSCI last week to withdraw an index rule that would remove Strategy from its global benchmarks, calling it discriminatory. Funds tracking those indexes hold 3.1% of Strategy’s basic shares.

The filing was signed by Thomas C. Chow, Strategy’s general counsel. MSCI’s consultation closes at the end of September, with a decision due October 16.