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MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor From BTC Skeptic to Bitcoin Maximalism

MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor went from cryptocurrency skeptic to Bitcoin bull in just seven years, but his eyes are for Bitcoin and Bitcoin only.

NASDAQ listed business intelligence company, MicroStrategy has made the decision to use Bitcoin as its primary reserve currency, recently adding to it’s $250 million August BTC investment with an additional $175 Million in the safe haven digital asset last week.

MicroStrategy’s CEO Michael Saylor indicated in recent tweets that he sees a clear distinction between Bitcoin and other altcoins and heavily favor BTC, as evident by his company’s hedge strategy.

In a tweet on Sept. 20, Saylor noted the difference between crypto-asset networks (ie.Bitcoin) and crypto-application networks (ie.Ethereum). Saylor wrote:

“When considering network dominance in the crypto industry, I find it clarifying to separate crypto-asset networks like Bitcoin from crypto-application networks like Ethereum & stablecoins. Bitcoin dominance has advanced from a low of 71.05% on December 20, 2017, to 93.57% today.”

Saylor’s data however was a little selective for his twitter following as the data from Bitcoin Dominance only measures proof-of-work cryptocurrencies that are attempting to be money.

By other metrics, CoinMarketCap has the Bitcoin’s dominance at a yearly low of 56.67% on Sept 13, but this data also takes stablecoins like Tether into account.

However, Saylor is intentionally selective when it comes to this data. Bitcoin Dominance’s figures do not include initial coin offerings or stablecoins, but rather “only includes coins using proof-of-work that are attempting to be money.”

Saylor Leans to Bitcoin Maximalism

MicroStrategy’s CEO Saylor appears to have done a complete reversal on his view of Bitcoin since 2013 when he tweeted: “Bitcoin’s days are numbered. It seems like just a matter of time before it suffers the same fate as online gambling.”

As mentioned, in recent weeks MicroStrategy has taken a huge bullish on Bitcoin, buying 21,454 BTC, worth $250 million at the time of purchase in August and added $175 million worth of capital allocation to the asset last week.

When confronted with this statement by Morgan Creek Digital co-founder Anthony Pompliano during a podcast interview, Saylor admitted he doesn’t remember making the statement on Twitter.

Saylor now argues that Bitcoin is a dominant safe-haven asset and said to Pompliano, “Bitcoin scales just fine as a store of value.”

Bitcoin Less Risky than Cash or Gold says MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor

MicroStrategy’s Chief Executive Officer Michael Saylor says the Federal Reserve’s new relaxed inflation policy helped convince him to put the remainder of the enterprise-software maker’s cash into Bitcoin.

“We feel pretty confident that Bitcoin is less risky than holding cash, less risky than holding gold,” Saylor said in an interview with Bloomberg.

In the wake of the Fed officials of the Federal Open Market Committee’s (FOMC) announcement that they will continue to hold US interest rates close to zero and will continue to push inflation above 2% by 2023—Saylor became convinced that Bitcoin was the best option for another $175 million hedge investment from MicroStrategy.

Saylor believes the US dollar will soon lose significant purchasing power and that asset inflation will surge to more than 20%.

Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, MicroStrategy had most of its capital, roughly $500 million, invested in short-term United States government securities, a conventional strategy for a public company. But when the pandemic disruption hit and yield began to tumble, Saylor began to feel that MicroStrategy’s investment was on “a $500 million melting ice cube.”

Following a negative 10% yield on MicroStrategy’s treasury, the company considered other safe havens like gold and real estate but found Bitcoin to be a much more rational investment given its scarcity.

In August, MicroStrategy announced its new capital allocation investment strategy with a purchase of 21,454 Bitcoins—making it the first and largest independent publicly-traded business intelligence firm to invest the majority of its treasury into Bitcoin.

After MicroStrategy’s show of confidence in Bitcoin, Max Keiser the prominent RT anchor said that he believes other private companies will likely follow suit. Saylor is predicting this will also happen in the next three to six months.

CEO Could Liquidate All BTC if Needed

While Saylor does not appear to think much of any cryptos besides Bitcoin, he asserts he and his company are not married to Bitcoin either, and that MicroStrategy would not hesitate to liquidate its entire portfolio if necessary.

“We can liquidate it any day of the week, any hour of the day,” Saylor told Bloomberg. “If I needed to liquidate $200 million of Bitcoin, I believe I could do it on a Saturday. If I took a haircut, I believe it would be 2%.”

Thankfully for the Bitcoin price, Saylor does not seem intent on dumping MicroStrategy’s BTC treasury just yet, and he says that so far his 10 largest shareholders have been very supportive of the investment.

Square's $50 Million in Bitcoin is Better for Crypto than MicroStrategy's $425 Million BTC Investment

Square, Jack Dorsey’s fintech payments company, just announced today that it purchased $50 million worth of Bitcoin which now makes up 1% of the firm’s reserve assets. While smaller than MicroStrategy’s BTC investment, the implications for the crypto markets are predicted to be far greater.

While Square’s investment is significantly smaller than MicroStrategy’s $425 million dollar BTC purchase over August and September, the effects could be significantly greater for Bitcoin’s visibility and maturity in the mainstream markets.

Square which was co-founded by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, bought over 4,700 BTC earlier today, which comes just shortly after business intelligence firm MicroStrategy’s second dip into the digital hedge asset of $175 million in Bitcoin in September.

Following the announcement by Square, several notable experts have come forward to discuss what the move could mean for Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency industry.

As reported by Forbes on Oct. 9, Tim Enneking, Managing Director of Digital Capital Management said that Square’s investment is “more impactful than the MicroStrategy announcement.”

Enneking said:

“Although the MicroStrategy investment is considerably more, the company and its CEO (Michael Saylor) are not nearly as well known as Square and Dorsey, particularly in the tech sector.”

Forbes reported that these comments were supported by Jesse Proudman, CEO of crypto hedge fund Strix Leviathan, added some support to these Enneking’s assessment. Proudman said:

“As Bitcoin holds value for different reasons to different people, institutional adoption can take many forms […]Given Jack Dorsey’s prominence, Square’s Bitcoin acquisition will bring additional attention to the notion of Bitcoin as a corporate hedge to USD inflation.”

Proudman added, “This marks the second public company following MicroStrategy’s recent purchases (collectively $425M) to adopt this strategy and is likely indicative of a wave of further interest.”

Director of Institutional Research for TradeBlock, JoshTodaro said:

“Unlike institutional investment adoption from a fund standpoint, which we have seen in the past, we are now seeing institutional adoption from a corporate standpoint in which Bitcoin is being treated less as a speculative investment and more as an inflation resistant reserve asset on corporates’ balance sheets.”

Dollar crash and double-dip recession odds are high

Market uncertainty has accelerated the adoption of Bitcoin on an institutional level as the crypto is being treated less as a speculative investment and more as an inflation resistant reserve asset.

As reported, Economist Stephen Roach believes that the US dollar is set to crash and that a double-dip recession’s odds are above 50 percent. Bitcoin has long benefited from the weakening of the US dollar, as the greenback is the world’s predominant reserve asset.

Stephen Roach, who was the former chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia, previously predicted back in June 2020, that the US dollar could crash by 35 percent against foreign currencies.

Recently, Roach told CNBC that he could see the US dollar crash happening by the end of 2021.

Bitcoin Price Surges to 2020 High of $15,960, MicroStrategy Sees $182 Million Increase

The Bitcoin price reached a new high for 2020 gaining over 12% in the last 24 hrs to reach $15,960 with many analysts predicting that the surge is set to continue to $17,000.

Over the last 24 hours, the price of Bitcoin (BTC) has surged by 12% and smashed through the $15,000 resistance for the first time since January 2018. The price of $15,960 is a new high for the year.

Source: Trading View BTC/USDT

According to data from Trading View, the BTC/USD pair has gained over $1800 dollars and 12.86% in the last 24 hours. According to crypto data analytics platform Messari, Bitcoin has now managed to stay above the $15,000 support for 20 days of its life-cycle, roughly 0.4% of its life.

Grayscale CEO Barry Silbert, whose firm’s AUM is rising rapidly triumphantly reported on Twitter:

“People will never again say Bitcoin is dead.”

MicroStrategy is now looking like geniuses to the rest of the world after choosing Bitcoin as its reserve asset. As reported by MicroStrategy Bitcoin tracker on Twitter, the intelligence firm is up by $182 million dollar in the last 24 Hours—their original investment of $425 million in BTC is now valued at $607,639,500.

Bitcoin’s bullish behavior has been rampant in the lead up to the US elections and the prevailing uncertainty. While US presidential candidate Joe Biden is just six electoral votes away from victory, with officials continuing to count ballots in Georgia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Arizona, and Nevada. Head of Research at Blockchain.com and top UK economist Dr. Garrick Hileman told Blockchain.News that the prevailing uncertainty is one of the forces behind BTC’s continued bull run. He said:

“Anything that negatively impacts the perception of a safe and stable dollar will likely boost interest in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.”

BTC is also surging amid the news the US Department of Justice has seized more than $1 billion dollars from an anonymous hack who managed to crack a wallet connected with the infamous silk road.

For now, the BTC price surge appears set to continue with may analyst predicting we should reach $17,000 in the next few days, but get ready for some extreme volatility as the markets continue to watch the election results.

MicroStrategy Adds Additional 2574 Bitcoins To its BTC Portfolio for $50 Million

Nasdaq-listed MicroStrategy Inc has made another move to shore up its Bitcoin portfolio by purchasing an additional 2574 BTC as announced by Michael Saylor, the company’s Chief Executive Officer.

According to an update posted on his Twitter handle, Saylor revealed that;

“MicroStrategy has purchased approximately 2,574 bitcoins for $50.0 million in cash in accordance with its Treasury Reserve Policy, at an average price of approximately $19,427 per bitcoin.”

According to the SEC filing detailing the purchase and as shared by the CEO, the company “now hold approximately 40,824 bitcoins,” which it purchased at “an aggregate purchase price of $475.0 million, inclusive of fees and expenses.”

Since MicroStrategy announced its first Bitcoin purchase back in August, the company has not slowed down in shoring up its Bitcoin reserves. MicroStrategy’s bullish nature on Bitcoin is one of the most renowned among Wall Street firms who have taken a position with Bitcoin either as a hedge against inflation or as a store of value for increased returns.

MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin investment drive has not been impacted by the market price of the coin. While the company purchased its first Bitcoin at an average price of $9,882 per BTC, it made its recent purchase despite the price being $19,427.

While other publicly listed companies including Square Inc have also taken up a position with Bitcoin, MicroStrategy’s belief with its new capital allocation investment strategy is that Bitcoin has the inherent capabilities to maximize profit for the company’s shareholders in the long-term.

“This investment reflects our belief that Bitcoin, as the world’s most widely-adopted cryptocurrency, is a dependable store of value and an attractive investment asset with more long-term appreciation potential than holding cash. Since its inception over a decade ago, Bitcoin has emerged as a significant addition to the global financial system, with characteristics that are useful to both individuals and institutions,” said Saylor in a statement

MicroStrategy to Issue $400 Million in Securities Offering to Hoard More Bitcoin

The world’s largest intelligence firm, MicroStrategy has announced that it would invest in more Bitcoin, using the proceeds from the $400 million securities offering. Michael Saylor, the CEO of the billion dollar firm revealed that the firm plans to issue $400 million securities offering into Bitcoin.

MicroStrategy announced that the firm has plans to issue $400 million in convertible senior notes, which is a debt security that can be converted into the company’s shares. The securities would be issued under the Rule 144 of the Securities Act, which would only be made available for qualified institutional investors. The firm’s press release added:

“MicroStrategy also expects to grant to the initial purchasers of the notes an option to purchase, within a 13-day period beginning on, and including, the date on which the notes are first issued, up to an additional $60 million aggregate principal amount of the notes. The offering is subject to market and other conditions, and there can be no assurance as to whether, when or on what terms the offering may be completed.”

The firm noted that MicroStrategy may offer an additional $60 million worth of notes to its initial purchases, during the 13 days of the offer’s commencement.

Not long ago, MicroStratgy’s CEO, Michael Saylor revealed that he had purchased another 2,574 Bitcoin, when the cryptocurrency was trading around $19,420, for around $50 million. The aggregate cryptocurrency holdings are now up to a total of around 40,824 BTC.

MicroStrategy made the decision to invest in Bitcoin earlier this year, taking one of the very first steps seen by the larger institutional ecosystem. Michael Saylor explained that he believes that the cryptocurrency is digital gold, which is smarter, and more efficient than any money that has preceded it.

According to Bitcoin’s price at press time, MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin reserves currently is worth more than $780 million, and the billion-dollar firm has gained around 65% on its $475 million investment.

Although it may seem like institutional adoption of Bitcoin is currently on the rise, CEO of the Real Vision Group, Raoul Pal recently commented that due to the fact that Saylor is very keen on Bitcoin, he may not be “speaking the right language of corporate treasurers,” and that still has yet to happen.

MicroStrategy Purchases Another $650M Bitcoin, Convincing Elon Musk Large Transactions Can be Done

Another weekend, another round of Bitcoin—MicroStrategy has announced another purchase of Bitcoin, this time, of $650 million in BTC. The billion-dollar intelligence firm has added to its Bitcoin stash, with a new purchase of 29,646 Bitcoin for $650 million, averaging $21,925 per BTC.

Bitcoin has recently consolidated after reaching its new all-time high at over $24,100. MicroStrategy’s CEO, Michael Saylor tweeted the announcement as Bitcoin has seen a correction.

MicroStrategy now owns more Bitcoin than the United States government, making it the fifth largest holder of BTC. The US government has around 69,420 Bitcoin, which makes it the sixth largest holder of the cryptocurrency.

MicroStrategy has now a total of 70,470 BTC, the average price per Bitcoin at $15,964. The publicly-traded billion dollar software firm first announced its Bitcoin investment strategy, with an initial purchase of 21,454 Bitcoins.

The billion-dollar firm invested in Bitcoin during a period of economic uncertainty, due to COVID-19, and the roll out of stimulus. The investment decision was made as part of the company’s two-pronged capital allocation approach as announced in the company’s second-quarter 2020 financial results in late July this year.

Michael Saylor convinces Elon Musk to shift dollars to Bitcoin

Michael Saylor recently encouraged the Tesla founder to shift his US dollars from Tesla’s balance sheet to Bitcoin. He said:

“If you want to do your shareholders a $100 billion favor, convert the $TSLA balance sheet from USD to #BTC. Other firms on the S&P 500 would follow your lead & in time it would grow to become a $1 trillion favor.”

This came after Elon Musk has tweeted a series of tweets suggesting that he has been tempted to invest in Bitcoin, as the cryptocurrency’s price has recently skyrocketed. Musk replied to Saylor, asking:

“Are such large transactions even possible?”

Saylor responded that he has purchased over $1.3 billion in Bitcoin the past few months, and is happy to share with Musk his playbook.

MicroStrategy to issue $400 million in securities to buy more Bitcoin

Bitcoin is Emerging as The New Institutional Grade Safe-Haven Asset in 2021, says MicroStrategy CEO

Michael Saylor, the Chief Executive Officer of MicroStrategy, has noted that one of the most endearing things about Bitcoin (BTC) in 2021 is that it is a “new, compelling institutional-grade safe haven asset” that is capable of attracting more mainstream investors.

The ongoing bull run in the price of Bitcoin takes its deep roots in the massive embrace of institutions on Wall Street from the third quarter of 2020 forward. The adoption saw the likes of MicroStrategy, a business intelligence firm that has invested more than $1.3 billion to buy more than 70,000 BTC, using the digital asset to line with its Treasury Reserve. The online payment giant PayPal has also announced support for Bitcoin trading and a selected list of altcoins on its platform.

Based on the ongoing adoption, Michael Saylor sees more uptick in corporate firms completing their balance sheets with Bitcoin in the future. He noted:

“Bitcoin is emerging in 2021 as the new, compelling institutional grade safe haven asset. Excess cash is a drag on shareholder value in the current monetary environment, so we can expect more firms to adopt Bitcoin as a treasury reserve asset.”

Bitcoin’s Price Making A Good Case for Attracting Potential Investors

There are now many Bitcoin advocates, particularly prominent business leaders, that have come to realize the inherent potentials in Bitcoin particularly as an alternative reserve asset to the United States Dollar. Bitcoin is also increasingly recognized as a hedge against inflation.

The self-imposed roles of these advocates are currently being boosted by the outstanding price performance of Bitcoin, as the cryptocurrency has touched an all-time high above $40,000 on more than one occasion. Many of these Bitcoin evangelists are also persuaded that Bitcoin has the potential to eventually record a price of $146,000 per coin within the next decade. Market experts who are certain that BTC is heading in that direction include JPMorgan Chase analysts, and this prediction has served to strengthen their support in the cryptocurrency. Additionally, JPMorgan believes that if BTC will continue cementing itself as an inflationary hedge, this could edge out gold by driving more investment flows into the leading cryptocurrency.

MicroStrategy CEO says Tesla has De-Risked BTC Acquisition for Public Companies

Bitcoin (BTC) advocate and the Chief Executive Officer of MicroStrategy Incorporated, Michael Saylor is thrilled that Elon Musk and Tesla finally took the big bet to put Bitcoin on the latter’s balance sheet and he believes other public companies will surely follow and ramp up BTC acquisition.

As reported by Blockchain.News, Tesla revealed it had purchased $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin on Monday, an announcement that sent the price of the digital currency to a new all-time high.

Michael Saylor has been instrumental to the adoption of Bitcoin by Tesla, and Elon Musk as he has become a very vocal advocate of corporations keeping their excess liquidity in Bitcoin. His advocacy is backed up by a similar move he has also made when he used about a sizeable amount of his investors’ money to purchase Bitcoin.

Ever since Saylor has offered to share his Bitcoin playbook with Musk based on his curiosity as to whether Bitcoin can process a large cash transaction. MicroStrategy responded to this curiosity by investing $650 million of investors’ money in Bitcoin at the time, bringing the total amount of invested funds above $1.3 billion.

Following the latest news that Elon’s Tesla has now joined the Bitcoin party, Saylor tweeted:

“Congratulations & thank you to @elonmusk & @Tesla on adding #Bitcoin to their balance sheet. The entire world will benefit from this leadership.”

In another tweet, Saylor said he believe that Tesla’s move has de-risked the acquisition of Bitcoin by publicly listed companies. Per his words:

“Tesla $TSLA has de-risked the acquisition of #bitcoin by public companies and accelerated the digital transformation of corporate balance sheets. Treasurers are now thinking about how to convert a non-performing asset into the best performing asset.”

Michael Saylor has been sharing a similar playbook with tons of other Wall Street firms through Webinars and virtual broadcasts. Expectations mount that Tesla’s move will prompt other top firms to join the Bitcoin party.

MicroStrategy CEO Says the Software Firm Is Considering Equity or Debt Financing to Purchase More Bitcoins

Michael Saylor, the chief executive of MicroStrategy Inc., has announced that the business intelligence software company is considering issuing more debt to help finance the firm’s purchase of more Bitcoins as part of its corporate strategy.

During an interview at the Bloomberg crypto summit on Thursday, February 25, Saylor said: “We’ve been pretty clear that we’ll consider equity and debt financings. It makes sense to buy as much of that asset class as we can.”

So far, MicroStrategy has issued two rounds of convertible senior notes to buy more of the digital assets. On February 19, the company completed its offering of $1.05 billion in convertible bonds, a raise that allowed the software firm to buy another $1 billion in Bitcoins. In December last year, the firm sold $400 million in convertible bonds and then bought $10 million worth of Bitcoin.

As of February 24, MicroStrategy owns 90,531 Bitcoins, after investing about $2.2 billion worth of Bitcoin in total since it began buying the cryptocurrency in August last year. Now, these holdings are worth around $4.5 billion.

During the interview, Saylor stated that the crypto’s finite number is one of the factors that made the leading cryptocurrency valuable. He described Bitcoin as “the scarcest asset in the world.” He added: “If you want to preserve shareholder value, you have to hold scarce assets. Bitcoin is the most liquid, scarce, uncorrelated asset you can buy.”

There are only 21 million Bitcoins that can be mined in total and currently, 18 million have been mined so far. This leaves about 3 million Bitcoins that are yet to be introduced into circulation. The last Bitcoin will be mined on May 7th 2140.

Saylor further said that companies should keep up with the cost of capital and work with institutional-grade custodians to hold their Bitcoins safely.

Bitcoin as The Next Big Treasure

Saylor has been one of the greatest supporters of converting the company’s cash reserves into Bitcoin, saying that the Federal Reserve relaxing its inflation policy helped to convince him to invest his company reserves into the crypto asset.

Saylor views the cryptocurrency as a hedge against a potential devaluation of the US dollar. So far, a number of firms have followed his Bitcoin’s strategy. Early this month, Tesla announced that it invested $1.5 billion of its $19 billion cash reserve into Bitcoin.