Author: Daniel Phillips and Stephen Gr; Translation: Plain Blockchain
For years, the idea of publicly traded companies buying Bitcoin as a reserve was considered laughable. This top cryptocurrency was seen as too volatile, too niche, and not something any serious corporation would adopt.
However, this taboo has been completely shattered, with many significant institutional investors buying Bitcoin in recent years.
When cloud software company MicroStrategy purchased $425 million worth of Bitcoin in August and September 2020, the floodgates opened. Other companies followed suit, including payment processor Block and electric car manufacturer Tesla.
According to data from BitcoinTreasuries, publicly traded companies holding Bitcoin now account for nearly 1.5% of the total 21 million Bitcoins in circulation.
1. MicroStrategy
MicroStrategy, a well-known business analytics platform, has made Bitcoin its primary reserve asset.
The company, which produces mobile software and cloud-based services, has actively pursued buying Bitcoin, acquiring millions of dollars worth of the cryptocurrency. As of May 2025, the company holds 214,400 Bitcoins, equivalent to $14.8 billion, exceeding 1% of the total Bitcoin supply.
MicroStrategy’s CEO, Michael Saylor, has stated that he used to buy $1,000 worth of Bitcoin every second. During the company’s first quarter earnings call in 2024, Saylor claimed that the company’s adoption of a “Bitcoin strategy” had improved its performance against competitors in the business intelligence field by 10 to 30 times.
Unlike other CEOs who typically avoid discussing personal investments, Saylor openly revealed that he personally holds 17,732 Bitcoins, currently valued at over $1.2 billion. This shift in attitude for the CEO of MicroStrategy can be seen as significant, as he had previously claimed in 2013 that Bitcoin’s days were numbered.
Saylor stated during the company’s first quarter earnings call in 2024, “We are in the early stages of institutional adoption of Bitcoin as a digital asset.” He added, “In the future, Bitcoin will not compete with other cryptocurrencies, but with gold, art, stocks, real estate, bonds, and other forms of store of value in wealth creation, wealth preservation, and capital markets.”
2. Marathon Digital Holdings Inc.
Unsurprisingly, Bitcoin mining company Marathon Digital is also a significant holder of Bitcoin, with 176,310 Bitcoins in its corporate reserves (valued at approximately $1.23 billion as of May 2024). The company aims to become one of the largest Bitcoin mining operators in North America, operating at the lowest energy cost. Prior to transitioning to crypto mining, the company was initially a patent holding company (often referred to as a “patent troll”).
As of May 2024, Marathon Digital operates around 240,000 Bitcoin mining machines, capable of producing 29.9 EH/s of computing power, with an average operational hash rate of 21.1 EH/s.
The company noted that after the Bitcoin halving in 2024, it accelerated its growth plans to “mitigate impacts” and aims to double its mining operations by 2024.
However, the company failed to meet its revenue targets in the first quarter of 2024, citing reasons such as “unexpected equipment failures, power line maintenance, and weather-related restrictions higher than expected in Garden City and other locations.”
3. Tesla
Electric car manufacturer Tesla joined the ranks of companies holding Bitcoin in December 2020, investing a total of $1.5 billion in Bitcoin according to an SEC filing.
Tesla sold 10% of its Bitcoin holdings in the first quarter of 2021; according to CEO Elon Musk, this was done to demonstrate the liquidity of Bitcoin as an alternative to holding cash.
After Musk’s tweets about Bitcoin, speculation grew for months about Tesla’s Bitcoin investment. By the end of 2020, MicroStrategy’s Saylor expressed willingness to share his Bitcoin investment “strategy” with Musk, suggesting that Tesla’s foray into Bitcoin would bring “tremendous benefits” of $100 billion to Tesla shareholders.
However, Musk and Tesla’s relationship with Bitcoin has been tumultuous. Just two months after announcing that Tesla would accept Bitcoin for its products and services in March 2021, Musk suddenly declared that the company would no longer accept Bitcoin as payment.
Musk cited the increasing use of fossil fuels in Bitcoin mining and transactions as a reason for the decision, stating that Tesla would not sell any of its Bitcoin holdings and would reconsider using it for transactions once mining shifts to more sustainable energy. He later clarified that the company would resume using Bitcoin for transactions once miners use 50% clean energy.
In July 2022, Tesla revealed in its second-quarter update that the company had sold around 75% of its Bitcoin holdings, with its balance sheet showing total digital asset sales of $936 million. During a call with analysts, Musk stated that the company did this to strengthen its cash position in response to uncertainties from COVID lockdown measures. He also added that the company “is willing to increase our Bitcoin holdings in the future, so this should not be seen as some kind of judgment on Bitcoin.”
According to data from bitcointreasuries.org, as of May 2024, Tesla held 97,200 Bitcoins in its investment portfolio (valued at approximately $677 million at current prices). The company has maintained its Bitcoin position, with its first-quarter balance sheet for 2024 showing an estimated value of $184 million as of the third quarter of 2023 and the first quarter of 2024.
Musk has also become an avid supporter of Dogecoin, with Tesla allowing the use of Dogecoin to purchase some goods.
4. Hut 8 Mining Corp
Bitcoin mining company Hut 8 holds 91,090 Bitcoins, valued at approximately $644 million at current prices.
The company went public on the Nasdaq Global Select Market in June 2021, with the stock symbol HUT. The company’s SEC filing noted its commitment to increasing shareholder value by increasing its Bitcoin holdings and value.
The company also explained that through revenue account arrangements established with leading digital asset prime brokerages, it leverages its self-mined and held Bitcoin reserves to generate fiat currency income.
In November 2023, the company merged with another Bitcoin mining company, US Bitcoin, forming a company that calls itself an “energy infrastructure company targeting Bitcoin mining and data centers.” These mining centers are located in six locations in Alberta, Texas, and New York, reportedly achieving a self-mining capacity of 7.5 EH/s.
In its first-quarter performance report for 2024, the company reported revenue of $51.7 million for the quarter, a 231% year-over-year increase.
5. Riot Platforms, Inc.
Another US-based cryptocurrency mining company, Riot Blockchain, holds 90,840 Bitcoins, valued at $643 million as of today’s prices.
The company’s valuation has increased from less than $200 million in 2020 to over $6 billion in 2021, and this publicly traded company has undergone significant expansion. In April 2021, the company spent $650 million to acquire a one-gigawatt Bitcoin mining facility in Rockdale, Texas; the company described this purchase as a “transformative event,” making it the “largest publicly traded Bitcoin mining and hosting company in North America measured by total developed capacity.”
In April 2022, Riot announced plans to further develop an additional one-gigawatt mining facility in Navarro County, Texas. Following the cryptocurrency market crash in 2022, CEO Jason Les told Yahoo Finance that Bitcoin mining would “continue to thrive in the US” and noted that “despite the diminishing economic benefits of Bitcoin mining, there are still enormous opportunities here.”
By January 2023, the company rebranded as Riot Platforms, aiming to diversify its business model as the cryptocurrency mining industry faces ongoing challenges from cryptocurrency winters and rising energy prices.
In early 2024, the company warned shareholders that it could not guarantee a positive impact on its profitability from the upcoming Bitcoin halving. In June, the company became a target of short-selling firm Kerrisdale, which claimed that “Bitcoin mining is one of the dumbest business models we’ve encountered in our past 15 years of short trading.” However, the company’s stock price quickly recovered after an initial drop following the report.
6. Coinbase Global, Inc.
Undoubtedly, the most well-known cryptocurrency company on this list is the cryptocurrency exchange platform Coinbase, which conducted a landmark direct listing on the Nasdaq in April 2021.
Before going public, in February 2021, Coinbase revealed that it held $230 million worth of Bitcoin on its balance sheet. By June 2024, it holds 90,000 Bitcoins in its reserves, valued just under $642 million.
7. Galaxy Digital Holdings
Galaxy Digital Holdings, a business bank focused on cryptocurrencies, holds 81,000 Bitcoins. This is a decrease from the 164,000 Bitcoins it held in July 2022, although the growth in Bitcoin prices means its Bitcoin holdings in June 2024 are valued close to $578 million, compared to $357 million two years prior.
Galaxy Digital Holdings, founded by Michael Novogratz in January 2018, has partnerships with cryptocurrency companies including Block.one and BlockFi. Not surprisingly, Novogratz is a staunch supporter of Bitcoin, stating in March 2024 that Bitcoin will never drop below $50,000 again and predicting Bitcoin will surge to $100,000 by the end of the year.
Galaxy Digital is one of the companies managing US spot Bitcoin trading platform exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which received historic approval from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in January 2024.
8. Block, Inc.
In October 2020, Block, Inc. lit the spark for institutional Bitcoin investment along with Tesla, investing $50 million in Bitcoin at the time. By June 2024, the company holds 80,270 Bitcoins, valued at approximately $573 million. This is perhaps not surprising, as the company’s CEO Jack Dorsey is a strong advocate for Bitcoin (even running his own Bitcoin node).
At the time of the initial investment, the company described it as part of “Square’s continued commitment to Bitcoin” and noted that the company plans to continually evaluate its total investment in Bitcoin based on other investment circumstances.
The company has made investments in Bitcoin technology, launching its own Bitcoin wallet, and developing Bitcoin mining ASIC chips. In April 2024, its payment service subsidiary Square announced that businesses using its Cash App product would be able to automatically convert a portion of their daily sales into Bitcoin.
In May 2024, the company announced that it would reinvest 10% of profits from Bitcoin-related products and services in Bitcoin in a dollar-cost averaging (DCA) manner for purchasing plans.
The company changed its name from Square to Block in December 2021, apparently as a reference to the blockchain technology underlying Bitcoin. This rebranding was done a week after Dorsey announced his resignation as CEO of Twitter to focus on the payment company.
9. CleanSpark
US-based Bitcoin mining company CleanSpark holds 61,540 Bitcoins, valued at approximately $439 million as of June 2024.
Before the Bitcoin halving in 2024, the company expanded its operations and acquired three Bitcoin mining facilities in Mississippi for $198 million, increasing its mining capacity by 2.4 EH/s. The company also added a third facility in Dalton, Georgia, with an additional 0.8 EH/s of mining capacity.
In June 2024, CleanSpark revealed that they mined 417 Bitcoins in May, exceeding industry expectations in the first full production month after the halving. The company also plans to expand to a new location in Wyoming in the “coming days.”
10. Bitcoin Group SE
Based in Germany, venture capital company Bitcoin Group SE ranks lower on the list, holding a relatively modest 38,300 Bitcoins, valued at $275 million at current prices.
The company’s investments include the cryptocurrency exchange platform Bitcoin.de and Futurum Bank. These two companies merged in October 2020, forming the “first cryptocurrency bank in Germany.” This move came after the German parliament decided to allow banks to sell and store cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin Group SE’s Managing Director, Marco Bodewein, emphasized the opportunity to introduce institutional investors to the “high returns and security features” of cryptocurrencies.
