Tom Lee’s BitMine Adds $43 Million in Ethereum as Strategy Halts Bitcoin Buys

Leading Ethereum treasury firm BitMine Immersion Technologies stayed consistent in the face of declining crypto prices last week, adding nearly $43 million in ETH to its stash even while top Bitcoin treasury company Strategy opted against accumulating BTC. 

The firm now holds more than 5.7 million ETH, valued around $9 billion. It also holds around 206 Bitcoin, worth $12.3 million. 

“This past week was a challenging one for crypto investors as ETH fell by 8%, even as Ethereum witnessed notable positive developments such as the creation of Ethlabs, and even the Bank of England softened its stance around stablecoins,” said BitMine Chairman Tom Lee in a statement. (Disclaimer: Lee is an investor in Decrypt parent company, Dastan).

Ethlabs, a new nonprofit research and development lab dedicated to championing the future of the Ethereum network and its native asset, is financially backed by BitMine and competing treasury firm Sharplink. 

Lee maintained that crypto’s future looks bright, and said the firm “remains focused on the longer-term horizon,” highlighting tailwinds like agentic payments and institutional adoption of crypto rails. 

“We are nearing quarter-end for June, and it is not surprising to see ‘window dressing’ leading to investors reducing their holdings in assets which have fallen in the past three months,” he said. 

The firm’s primary treasury asset, ETH, has now fallen 22% in the last month of trading, recently trading hands at $1,567. At that mark, ETH is now 68% off its all-time high of $4,946. 

Bitcoin has performed marginally better, dipping 19% in the last month of trading and more than 52% from its all-time high of $126,080, changing hands on Monday at $59,324.

As its primary treasury vehicle slides, so too have shares in BitMine (BMNR). The firm’s stock has fallen nearly 17% in the last five trading days and more than 31% in the last month of trading, recently trading at $13.21—down about 2.6% so far Monday.

Shares are now down more than 91% from a 52-week high of $161 established shortly after the firm adopted its Ethereum treasury strategy last June. 

That crypto-amassing model was pioneered by Bitcoin giant Strategy and its co-founder and Executive Chairman Michael Saylor, who started aggressively accumulating BTC in 2020. While the firm had aggressively and consistently added BTC on a nearly weekly basis in recent years, it did not add to its holdings last week amid scrutiny of its preferred equity offering, STRC, which fell to new lows on Friday.

Instead, the firm approved plans to sell up to $1.25 billion worth of Bitcoin to build up its cash reserves to fuel dividend payments.