Michael Saylor’s Strategy — the largest corporate holder of bitcoin on the planet — has sold bitcoin for the first time since late 2022, and the market felt it immediately.
The company disclosed in an 8-K filing Monday morning that it sold 32 BTC between May 26 and May 31 at an average price of $77,135 per coin, bringing in $2.5 million in total proceeds. The sale was executed to fund distributions on Strategy’s preferred stock, STRC — a high-yield instrument the company designed to maintain a $100 par value for investors.
The news hit an already fragile crypto market. Bitcoin slipped below $72,000 following the filing’s release, down nearly 3% over the prior 24 hours. More than $93 million in crypto futures positions were liquidated in a single hour, with 95% of those being long positions.
Bitcoin accounted for $72.34 million of that figure. The 24-hour liquidation tally reached $402 million across 135,585 traders — $275 million in longs and $127 million in shorts.
Not Strategy’s first rodeo selling bitcoin
This is not the first time Strategy has sold from its bitcoin stack, though the gap between sales spans years. In December 2022, near the bottom of that cycle’s bear market, the company sold 704 BTC at approximately $18,000 each.
Two days later, it bought back 810 BTC at a lower price in what most described as a tax-loss trade. That episode is now being cited by some bulls as a potential bottoming signal — though the parallel is far from certain.
Strategy now holds 843,706 BTC as of May 31, worth roughly $61 billion at current prices. The firm’s total cost basis sits at $75,699 per coin, totaling approximately $63.9 billion including fees.
At Monday’s prices, that puts Strategy’s position at an implied paper loss of about $2.9 billion. Its holdings represent more than 4% of bitcoin’s fixed 21 million coin supply.
The balance sheet behind the sale
Saylor has been transparent about the math. During Strategy’s Q1 2026 earnings call, he told investors that bitcoin needs to appreciate at just 2.3% per year for the company’s existing holdings to cover STRC dividend obligations in perpetuity — without selling common stock. He also said the company would buy 10 to 20 bitcoin for every one it sells, framing the STRC-driven disposals as a net-accumulation strategy over time.
Last week, Strategy also raised $128.3 million through its at-the-market common stock program. The company has approximately $26.1 billion left under its ATM program. As of May 31, its USD cash reserve stood at $900 million — down from a higher level after it used $1.38 billion to retire $1.5 billion in face value of 2029 convertible notes at an 8% discount to par.
The Strategy disclosure was not the only weight on bitcoin heading into Monday. U.S.-listed spot bitcoin ETFs logged a record 10-session outflow streak through Friday, May 29, with $2.97 billion drained between May 15 and May 29.
Meanwhile, Brent crude climbed above $93 a barrel on stalled U.S.-Iran ceasefire talks, pulling risk appetite from broader markets.
MSTR shares fell 5.15% in premarket trading. U.S. equity futures, by contrast, pointed higher across all three major indices, extending the prior week’s record highs — a divergence that underscores crypto’s current disconnect from the broader risk-on environment.
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