Business software company MicroStrategy Inc. purchased another 1,914 bitcoins in the final weeks of the year for $94.2 million in cash, it said in a new federal filing on Thursday.
It's just the latest buy for MicroStrategy, whose CEO Michael Saylor has become an ardent fan of cryptocurrencies and which has been buying bitcoin in significant amounts since August 2020. This purchase brings MicroStrategy's (NASDAQ: MSTR) year-end tally up to 124,391 bitcoins at a total price tag of $3.75 billion, or an average of $30,159 per bitcoin, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
The company's final purchase this year amounted to $49,229 per bitcoin, including fees and expenses. The price of Bitcoin was down Thursday to $47,182.80 from an all-time high last month of $69,400 per unit. That puts the worth of MicroStrategy’s bitcoin holdings at $5.87 billion today.
As part of its third-quarter earnings report, the Tysons company said it spent $2.035 billion to purchase 43,573 units of bitcoin in the first nine months of the year. In that same period, MicroStrategy reported it had generated $376.2 million in revenue, a 7.7% increase from the same period in the prior year, and a $445.5 million net loss, a 4,274% increase from the prior year. The latter was primarily due to $684 million in impairment charges the company recorded for the first nine months of this year, based on the carrying value of the bitcoins, or their lowest value at any point since they were bought.
MicroStrategy counted $16.4 million in total cash and equivalents across its U.S. holdings and $40.6 million outside of the U.S., as of Sept. 30, per its latest quarterly report.
In the year's final quarter, the company continued its bitcoin binge, purchasing thousands more. Across October and November, it purchased 7,002 bitcoins for $414.4 million. From Nov. 29 to Dec. 8, it bought another 1,434 bitcoins for $82.4 million in cash. Its latest purchase, from between Dec. 9 and Dec. 29, brings its 2021 bitcoin purchases to $2.626 billion for 53,923 bitcoins, increasing its holdings by more than 76%.
Since June, the company has funded these bitcoin investments through $1 billion worth of stock sales, as per an open market sale agreement it had inked that month with New York investment bank Jefferies LLC, according to an SEC filing. As part of that sale, the company raised $94.2 million by selling 167,759 shares at $565.78 apiece between Dec. 9 and Dec. 29 for its latest buy, per the SEC filing.
The company's stock has soared this past year-plus. It was trading at $571.57 per share as of Thursday afternoon — less than half of its 52-week high of $1,315, but up more than four times its $122.15 share price at the end of July 2020.
Expect the company's focus on cryptocurrency to stretch into 2022. During MicroStrategy's third-quarter earnings call, Saylor said there are no plans to sell any bitcoin the company has acquired. “We believe that Bitcoin represents a great long-term investment for the shareholders,” he said.
