Author: Claude, Deep Tide TechFlow

Deep Tide Insight: The pause in the accumulation by Strategy, the largest corporate Bitcoin holder globally, is nearing its end. CEO Phong Le clearly stated in an interview with FOX Business that the company will resume buying Bitcoin within this year. Over the past more than seven months, the company has purchased approximately 175,000 coins and sold about 7,000 coins, resulting in a net buying volume that is 25 times the net selling volume. For the market, this means that the largest public holder will re-establish buyer support, serving as a micro indicator of institutional confidence.

On August 10, Eastern Time, Phong Le, CEO of Strategy (NASDAQ: MSTR, formerly MicroStrategy), accepted an interview with FOX Business and provided a timetable for the return of accumulation. According to a report from Cointelegraph on August 12, Le clearly stated that the company plans to resume Bitcoin accumulation "within this year," ending a pause of over two months that began in May.

"We will resume purchasing more Bitcoin this year," Le said during the interview.

Purchased 175,000 coins, sold about 7,000, with net buying 25 times net selling

Let's lay out the figures. The numbers provided by Le during the interview indicate that since the beginning of this year, Strategy has bought approximately 175,000 Bitcoins and sold about 7,000, with the buying volume being "25 times" the selling volume. In other words, this pause in accumulation that has sparked market discussions, when viewed over the entire year, still reflects a company with an astonishing net buying volume.

"Our buying volume is about 25 times the selling volume," Le said. He also added that the company has surpassed previous holders ahead of it, becoming the world's largest institutional Bitcoin holder.

As of the latest disclosure, Strategy holds 840,447 Bitcoins, accounting for about 4% of the global circulating total. With an average cost of $75,482, the total investment in these holdings is approximately $64 billion; at the current price of about $64,000, the market value is roughly $54 billion, resulting in an unrealized loss of about $10 billion.

Where do the sales go: Preferred stock dividends, stock buybacks, and dollar reserves

Since they remain net buyers this year, why have they been continuously selling since May? The answer lies in the company's capital structure.

Le explained during the Q2 earnings call on August 3 that the proceeds from sales have three destinations: preferred stock dividends, stock buybacks, and dollar reserves. At the end of June this year, the company’s board approved a "Digital Credit Capital Framework," authorizing up to $1.25 billion in Bitcoin liquidation for the purpose of paying dividends, interest, and buybacks. This obligation is not small, with annual preferred stock dividends and interest expenses alone amounting to about $1.76 billion, of which the annual dividend yield for the STRC preferred stock is as high as 12%.

"We will sell Bitcoin when it is advantageous to the company, and we have already begun to do so," Le said during the call, "It is expected that we may continue to do so in the future."

For Le, the most important lesson of the bear market in 2026 is: there must be dollars on the books. He candidly stated during the call, "We originally thought liquidity Bitcoin was very important, but Mike (Executive Chairman Michael Saylor) previously mentioned that investors holding these preferred stocks view Bitcoin differently than they view dollars." He indicated that the company's dollar reserves have risen from about $800 million to about $4.7 billion over the past few months, enough to cover more than two years of dividend and interest obligations.

Breaking the "never sell" pledge, market and Wall Street's reactions

The reason the pause in accumulation has caused such a stir is that Strategy has personally broken the "never sell" mantra that was maintained for many years.

Starting in August 2020, Saylor transformed the company into a Bitcoin treasury, establishing the entire investment logic on "never selling." The market thus gave MSTR a premium. In late May, the company sold 32 Bitcoins for $2.5 million to pay preferred stock dividends, marking the first sale since December 2022. On the day of the announcement, Bitcoin briefly dropped to a two-month low, and MSTR's stock price fell about 5% in a single day. JPMorgan subsequently downgraded its rating from "overweight" to "cautious" and warned that the company faced about $1.7 billion in annual preferred stock dividend pressure.

Subsequent sales did not stop: from late June to early July, 3,588 coins were sold for $216 million; in mid-July, 1,638 coins were sold; in early August, another 1,690 coins were sold for $108.6 million. As of the time of writing, the company has had no new purchases for seven consecutive weeks, marking the longest gap since 2024, and the amount sold in 2026 has exceeded that of any previous year since the company started buying in 2020.

In response to the criticism, Saylor clarified on August 3: "When I say 'never sell your Bitcoin,' I am speaking as a saver to another saver." He stated that he has never sold his personally held Bitcoin and emphasized that Strategy has disclosed since 2020 that the company may buy and sell Bitcoin due to capital management needs.

The market is not convinced. MSTR's stock price has fallen about 38% this year, while Bitcoin has dropped around 25% in the same period, and this leveraged bet has amplified losses in the bear market. On August 11, MSTR closed at $96.09, down about 80% from its historic high in November 2024.

Buyer support and micro indicators of institutional confidence

So, what does Le's statement mean?

The most direct implication is that the largest institutional buying force in the Bitcoin market is coming back. In the first half of this year, Strategy purchased 175,000 Bitcoins via a capital increase and bond financing, making it one of the most important sources of demand during this period. If they resume accumulation in the second half, the company will re-establish support below the price.

On a deeper level, this serves as a micro indicator for observing the recovery of institutional confidence. During the period of halted accumulation, the company did three things: sold a small portion of its holdings, replenished dollar reserves, and maintained preferred stock dividends, essentially preserving credit for the public company during a bear market. Le's choice to announce "resuming purchases within this year" at a time when dollar reserves are sufficient and cover dividends for two years indicates that the company believes the most critical liquidity phase has passed.

Le stated this positioning very plainly. During the interview, he referred to Strategy as "the JPMorgan of the crypto economy": "Whether we sell 1,000 of the 840,000 coins, to me, has nothing to do with the core issue." He also told CoinDesk that Bitcoin has risen about 33% in the past year, while MSTR has increased about 42%. What the company aims to do is a more long-term endeavor: to ensure that the number of Bitcoins behind each share of MSTR continues to grow.

For holders, the good news is that the mantra is back; but this time, "never sell" has transformed into "sell when advantageous, buy when the market needs." The lessons the bear market teaches publicly traded companies will not disappear because of one statement.