Strategy CEO Phong Le has clarified the circumstances under which the company may consider selling portions of its bitcoin holdings, attempting to mitigate concerns following co-founder Michael Saylor’s recent comments.
During an appearance on CNBC’s Power Lunch, Le emphasized that any potential sales of bitcoin would be strictly based on financial rationale rather than ideological motives. He articulated that the decision would hinge on whether selling bitcoin to meet the 11.5% dividend obligation on the Series A Perpetual Stretch Preferred Stock (STRC) would enhance the company’s metrics for shareholders.
Le stated, “I believe in math over ideology, and at the point where selling Bitcoin versus selling equity to pay a dividend is better for our Bitcoin per share, and for our common shareholders, we will do it.” He underscored that such sales would only proceed if they were “accretive” to shareholders, meaning they would improve the company’s BTC-per-share metric.
These comments came in response to Saylor’s remarks earlier in the week during an earnings call, where he suggested that Strategy might periodically offload some bitcoin to support its dividend payments. Saylor indicated, “We’ll probably sell some Bitcoin to fund a dividend, just to inoculate the market, just to send the message that we did it.” He also pointed out that if bitcoin appreciates by more than 2.3% annually, it would enable Strategy to sustain its dividends indefinitely without resorting to common stock sales or diluting shareholders.
Strategy currently possesses 818,334 BTC, valued at over $66 billion, positioning it as the largest publicly traded bitcoin treasury company. Given the scale of its holdings, there have been worries about the potential impact on the market if the company were to offload significant portions of its bitcoin.
Addressing these concerns, Le noted that the daily trading volume for bitcoin stands at approximately $60 billion, which is more than adequate to absorb the company’s annual dividend obligation of just over $1 billion. “We could stop selling MSTR common stock right now. We can fund the dividends with Bitcoin sales,” he asserted, emphasizing the company’s financial strategy while aiming to reassure investors about the market dynamics.
