The Rise of Digital Asset Treasury Companies (DATCOs)

Introduction 

A new category of public companies has emerged at the intersection of crypto and TradFi: Digital Asset Treasury Companies (DATCOs). These are firms that explicitly pursue a strategy of accumulating digital assets (usually bitcoin) as a core function of their business. While Michael Saylor’s Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) laid the groundwork by pioneering BTC accumulation in 2020, this year a flurry of entrants and novel capital strategies have made DATCOs a central narrative in the equity and crypto markets.   

This report surveys the landscape of DATCOs, explores the market mechanics behind their valuations, visualizes their geographical distribution, and analyzes the capital structures that allow these firms to continue accumulating large crypto positions. We’ll also assess the risks of the model, particularly in scenarios where capital dries up or the equity premium collapses.

Executive Summary 

DATCOs now collectively hold over $100 billion in digital assets, led by publicly listed companies Strategy (MSTR), Metaplanet (3350.T) and SharpLink Gaming (SBET).  

• Bitcoin treasury companies dominate this category with over $93 billion in BTC holdings, while ETH-focused DATCOs have amassed over $4 billion in ETH. 

• Treasury companies hold 791,662 BTC and 1,313,318 ETH, representing ~3.98% of circulating BTC and ~1.09% of circulating ETH supply.  

• Strategy alone is sitting on over $28 billion in unrealized profit, with its BTC holdings worth $71.8 billion at current market prices. Smaller players also show low BTC cost bases and material upside.  

• New entrants are diversifying beyond BTC and ETH. Treasury companies have launched holding at least ten other digital assets, including SOL, XRP, BNB, and HYPE. 

• ETH treasury companies are employing strategies such as staking and DeFi yield, offering potential non-dilutive returns on treasury capital that BTC-only strategies cannot accomplish.  

• While the U.S. remains the hub, new entrants highlight a growing international demand for DATCOs, driven by regional capital market dynamics.  

• DATCOs are differentiated from ETFs by their ability to raise and deploy capital strategically and may benefit from narrative-driven investor inflows.  

• The DATCO model is vulnerable to premium collapses, regulatory changes, and capital market disruptions. Companies that rely too heavily on PIPEs or excessive leverage may suffer brutal drawdowns in less favorable market conditions.  

• While DATCOs currently are creating a positive feedback loop for cryptocurrency prices, if this category grows big enough, a potential unwind of the trade could conceivably have the opposite effect.  

• For now, though, the risk is theoretical, and excluding Strategy, DATCOs are relatively small players, holding only ~$32 billion, or just ~0.83% of the $3.8 trillion total crypto market cap. 

Definitions  

Before diving deeper, the following key terms are defined to provide clarity on concepts central to the DATCO model.  

Digital Asset Treasury Companies (DATCOs): Public firms that hold bitcoin or other digital assets on their balance sheets as a primary strategic function. Unlike traditional companies with incidental crypto exposure (for example, Tesla), DATCOs actively accumulate digital assets with the explicit intention of growing their holdings. Investors treat investing in these companies as levered, high-beta proxies for exposure to the asset they hold.  

Equity Premium to NAV: The premium to NAV quantifies how much higher a company’s equity is trading relative to its per-share net asset value (NAV). In this report, we’ll define equity premium to NAV as:  

Premium (%)= ((Share Price / NAV per Share) – 1) * 100 

This captures how richly or cheaply public equity markets are pricing the company’s digital assets.  

Note: this is distinct from a broader enterprise valuation premium (including debt or fully diluted share counts), which is often used when describing these companies.  

mNAV: Stands for “multiple of net asset value” and expresses the same concept as the premium, but as a multiple rather than a percentage.  

Example: A stock trading at a 2.75x mNAV has a 175% premium.  

ATM (At-the-Market Equity Programs): ATMs allow companies to issue shares incrementally at prevailing market prices. When a company trades at a premium to NAV, each dollar raised via an ATM buys more crypto per share than it dilutes. ATMs are typically the preferred capital formation vehicle among DATCOs because they scale easily and avoid steep discounts or large issuance events.  

PIPEs (Private Investments in Public Equity): PIPEs are negotiated capital raises where large investors purchase newly issued stock at agreed-upon prices, often in illiquid or low-float stocks. While PIPEs allow for rapid capital formation, they typically involve significant dilution and introduce short-term price risks. This is something we’ll describe in more detail later.  

Bitcoin Yield: Bitcoin Yield is a key performance indicator that tracks how efficiently a bitcoin treasury company grows BTC per diluted share over time. It reflects the firm’s capital efficiency, or how well it can raise funds and convert them into BTC without heavily diluting shareholders. Higher BTC Yield is correlated with higher equity premiums.  

Methodology 

This report draws on a range of primary and secondary data sources to analyze the structure, market impact, and capital strategies of DATCOs as of July 2025. The methodology prioritizes publicly available data and a consistent analytical framework across all included companies.  

Data Sources 

The analysis is based on a combination of:  

• Public financial filings  

• Press releases 

• On-chain analytics platforms 

• Company disclosures 

Inclusion Criteria 

To be classified as a DATCO and included in the analysis, a company must: 

• Be publicly listed on a major exchange (e.g., Nasdaq, Tokyo Stock Exchange) 

• Hold digital assets in significant quantities on its balance sheet 

• Pursue a deliberate treasury strategy, meaning accumulation is central to its business model  

• This excludes bitcoin mining companies whose asset holdings are primarily a byproduct of mining operations rather than capital allocation (e.g., Riot, Marathon) 

• Excludes Tesla and Block, whose digital asset purchases are not core to the business model 

 Holdings and Valuation Assumptions 

• BTC and ETH holdings are based on the most recent disclosed balance (as of July 28, 2025) 

• Market prices used in calculations (as of July 28): 

  • BTC price: $118,000 

  • ETH price: $3,800 

• All foreign currency holdings (e.g., Metaplanet in JPY, ALTBG in EUR) were converted to USD using spot FX rates at time of reporting:  

  • EUR/USD: 1.17 

  • JPY/USD: 144.2 

Historical Context  

The DATCO model was pioneered by Michael Saylor in 2020, when his company MicroStrategy became the first publicly traded company to convert a substantial portion of its cash reserves into bitcoin (bitcoin price at the time: $11,650). This move redefined how companies could view BTC: not just as a speculative asset, but as a strategic reserve “immune” to fiat debasement.  

MicroStrategy’s move boosted the company’s market capitalization and created a new narrative around BTC as a corporate treasury that others would follow.  

Saylor’s playbook (issuing debt to acquire more BTC, launching ATM equity programs, and bull-posting BTC publicly) established a repeatable model. For years, MicroStrategy stood alone, but it laid the foundation for future entrants.  

2023-2025  

From 2023 to 2025, several major catalysts fueled the rise of DATCOs from an isolated phenomenon to a formal narrative:  

• A 2023 FASB accounting update allowed fair-value treatment of digital assets, enabling public companies to mark their crypto holdings to market.  

• The SEC’s approval of U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs in 2024 validated bitcoin’s place in mainstream financial infrastructure.  

• Rising global tensions and fiat volatility pushed more firms to seek out bitcoin as a store of value.  

• In 2024, Metaplanet (3350.T), positioned itself as “Japan’s MicroStrategy” and executed a hyper-aggressive BTC accumulation strategy. Notably, Metaplanet became a case study in capital-efficient BTC growth outside of the U.S.  

• This year, we are witnessing the rise of altcoin-focused treasury strategies. Companies including SharpLink Gaming (SBET), BitMine (BMNR), and GameSquare (GAME) have adopted yield-enhanced treasury models. Other blockchains that don’t rely on proof-of-work as the consensus mechanism allow native staking rewards that have begun to appeal to certain companies.    

Why Do DATCOs Exist?  

Digital asset treasury companies serve as capital markets-native vehicles that provide amplified exposure to digital assets (especially bitcoin, and increasingly, other coins).  

An earlier Galaxy Research report, “Why Are Bitcoin Treasury Companies Trading at Such High Premiums to NAV?” explores this dynamic in detail.  

One of the structural tailwinds supporting the DATCO model is the regulatory limitation on direct crypto exposure faced by large institutional allocators. As economist Lyn Alden notes in “The Rise of Bitcoin Stocks and Bonds,” trillions of dollars in global capital are managed under mandates that prohibit direct ownership of digital assets but permit investments in publicly listed equities. For these investors (pensions, sovereign wealth funds, endowments), DATCOs offer compliant access to crypto exposure, and their share prices often reflect this scarcity. Instead of just buying the crypto already on the balance sheet, investors are buying the regulatory arbitrage and capital formation flywheel these companies represent.

Market Composition and Asset Concentration 

As of July 28, DATCOs collectively hold over 791,000 BTC and 1,300,000 ETH, representing approximately $93 billion and $5 billion in value, respectively, based on recent market prices.  

This composition shows the dominance of BTC among the strategies employed, but also a rising ETH treasury narrative, particularly among newer entrants that prioritize staking yield or ecosystem exposure.   

Strategy (MSTR) remains the core player by far, holding more than 600,000 BTC, which accounts for over 70% of all BTC held by public treasury companies. It’s the third-largest bitcoin investor of any kind; only Satoshi Nakamoto, the currency’s pseudonymous creator, and BlackRock’s ETF hold more. A second tier of treasury firms, including Metaplanet and Semler Scientific make up the next largest holders by market value and unrealized gains.   

While Strategy dominates, companies like Metaplanet and Semler Scientific also show substantial unrealized gains. Data reflects publicly disclosed balances and assumes a BTC market price of $118,000.  Note: Small discrepancies between calculated and reported unrealized gains may reflect variable FX rates at the time of acquisition.

Beyond BTC, a growing number of companies are executing altcoin-first treasury strategies. These firms, including SharpLink Gaming (SBET), Bit Digital (BTBT), and Tron Inc. (previously SRM Entertainment, ticker: TRON), are actively accumulating non-BTC digital assets and participating in yield-generating strategies. This model introduces a productive yield component to the strategy that pure bitcoin does not offer (at least, not yet… perhaps BTC-native yield will gain traction and become less risky).  

For a deep dive on how Ethereum is reshaping corporate treasury strategy, read Galaxy Digital analyst Christopher Rosa’s note on ETH as a treasury asset.  

While bitcoin remains the dominant asset by far across all DATCOs, firms are beginning to accumulate ETH, SOL, XRP, BNB, HYPE, and other tokens, often based on narrative-driven theses.  

Geographic Distribution of DATCOs 

DATCOs are now a global phenomenon. The map below, compiled by Galaxy Research using publicly disclosed crypto holdings, visualizes the global distribution of public DATCOs as of July 2025.  

To categorize each country’s level of DATCO activity, we sorted them into three tiers (high, low, and medium concentration) according to the number of public DATCOs and the scale of their digital asset holdings.  

The high-concentration tier includes countries with 10 or more publicly listed DATCOs, or whose companies hold exceptionally large crypto reserves (such as Japan, which qualifies for the high tier due to Metaplanet’s significant bitcoin treasury). The medium-concentration tier includes countries with three to nine DATCOs, representing growing institutional engagement and trend-level adoption. The low-concentration tier includes countries with one or two identified DATCOs, indicating early-stage participation and market-testing behavior.   

Valuation Dispersion and Equity Premiums 

Not all DATCOs are valued equally. Despite sharing a common strategy of accumulating digital assets, public market investors apply widely different equity premiums to NAV across the sector.  

The table below highlights this dispersion, comparing a cross-section of eight BTC, ETH, and TRX treasury companies with significant publicly disclosed digital asset holdings and market capitalizations as of July 28.    

Some trade at relatively modest premiums, such as MSTR’s 58% (reflecting its scale and maturity). In contrast, Metaplanet trades at a significantly higher premium (179%) due to its aggressive capital formation model. 

The dispersion is even more pronounced among ETH DATCOs. Bit Digital, for example, is trading at a 108% premium to the USD value of its ETH holdings. The yield potential unique to ETH appears to be priced in as future capital efficiency.  

Not all the premiums can be attributed to treasury strategy alone. Some of these companies have legitimate operating businesses that generate fundamental revenue. For instance, SharpLink Gaming runs a sports betting data platform.  

The chart above also includes Tron Inc., formerly SRM Entertainment, which staked 365 million TRX and adopted the ticker TRON. Despite a relatively small treasury compared to some BTC peers, it trades at a 64% premium, driven largely by branding alignment and narrative exposure to the TRON ecosystem. For emerging altcoin treasury plays, symbolism and signaling carry real valuation weight.  

Capital Strategy and Market Mechanics 

The central engine of the DATCO model is the ability to raise capital at a premium and turn that capital into more crypto per share. The companies that execute this loop most efficiently often trade at the largest premiums (Metaplanet is a prime example of this). This section unpacks the two most used tools: ATMs and PIPEs.  

ATMs 

Among established DATCOs, At-the-Market (ATM) programs are the go-to strategy for sustained accumulation. These allow companies to issue shares incrementally at prevailing market prices, avoiding the steep discounts and volatility that come with block offerings. ATMs give firms precise control: they can raise capital when demand is high and pause when markets turn, ensuring that issuance aligns with investors sentiment.  

When a DATCO trades at a premium to NAV, each dollar raised through an ATM can buy more crypto per share than it dilutes. This creates a crypto-per-share accretive loop: the company raises equity, buys tokens, and ends up with a higher NAV per share, further widening the premium (a mechanic referred to some in the industry as “accretive dilution”). Metaplanet has executed this strategy effectively, dynamically using its ATM program to scale BTC exposure.  

ATMs carry risk. Overuse can depress share price. But when used judiciously, they can be a capital-efficient growth engine for DATCOs. 

PIPEs 

Private investments in public equity (PIPEs) are often used by smaller or newer DATCOs to raise capital quickly. Unlike ATMs, PIPEs are negotiated transactions with large institutional buyers, typically priced at a fixed discount to market. They’re efficient in terms of speed and volume but introduce serious risks of dilution and future supply overhangs.  

Nakamoto (the company, not Satoshi) announced a $51.5 million PIPE financing to support its bitcoin treasury strategy in June 2025. The PIPE was completed in under 72 hours, priced at $5.00 per share. “We continue to execute our strategy to raise as much capital as possible to acquire as much bitcoin as possible,” Nakamoto CEO David Bailey said.  

BitMine and SharpLink Gaming have used PIPEs to fund ETH accumulation strategies. In both cases, the raises helped grow their token treasuries but also increased share count. 

While very effective in terms of speed and scale, rapid capital influx can suppress NAV-based valuations. Because PIPE shares are often issued with lockups, they introduce future sell pressures as investors anticipate supply entering the market. They are best deployed in high-premium environments where investors clearly understand the company’s capacity to convert capital into digital assets.  

PIPEs are not inherently bad or good. They are high-velocity tools that amplify both upside and downside.   

What Could Cause an Unwind?  

The DATCO growth model critically depends on a persistent equity premium to NAV. If the premium collapses, or worse, flips to a discount, the model begins to break.  

Several firms’ stocks are already beginning to flirt with discounts to NAV. In such cases, these companies may start buying back stock to arbitrage the discount, using their digital asset reserves or operational cash. (Already, Bitmine has secured board approval to repurchase up to $1 billion worth of its shares whenever management sees fit to do so.) If one or two companies pursue this route in isolation, it may not matter much to the broader ecosystem. But these DATCOs are largely correlated, both to each other and to the underlying cryptoasset markets upon which they are built. If redemptions or buybacks become widespread among firms, that could be the beginning of a larger-scale unwind.  

The treasury company trade is becoming increasingly crowded. Just in the past week, at least ten new companies have announced DATCO strategies. By now, the playbook is clear and capital is pouring in. But this is part of the risk. When hundreds of firms adopt the same one-directional trade (raise equity, buy crypto, repeat), it can become structurally fragile. A downturn in any of these three variables (investor sentiment, crypto prices, and capital markets liquidity) can start to unravel the rest.  

An unwind in the DATCO trade could exert significant downward pressure on digital asset prices themselves. In the same way that inflows from treasury companies have served as a “persistent bid” for bitcoin, outflows driven by redemptions would likely have the opposite effect. At the very least, there could be a halt in net accumulation.  

The 1920s investment trust boom followed a similar reflexive loop. Trusts traded at premiums to NAV, issued shares, and used the proceeds to buy more assets. When sentiment turned, those same mechanics amplified the downside. Collapsing premiums choked off access to capital while leverage magnified losses on falling assets. These cascading failures were an accelerant of the 1929 crash and subsequent Great Depression. DATCOs may be more transparent and better regulated than 1920s trusts, but the mechanics of mNAV-driven capital formation are eerily similar. 

One possible result of an unwind is sector consolidation. Larger, better-capitalized players like Strategy (MSTR), still trading at a premium, may begin acquiring smaller DATCOs at NAV discounts. These transactions would effectively allow buyers to acquire BTC at a discount using their own equity. This only works as long as the acquirer retains a premium, though.  

As these firms continue to scale, their influence over digital asset markets grows accordingly. An unwind would weaken the strongest tailwind crypto has had this cycle: the normalization of digital assets on corporate balance sheets. An unwinding of the DATCO trade could conceivably dull the public equity markets’ appetite for digital asset exposure of any kind, slowing inflows into crypto ETFs, which, all else equal, would weigh on the underlying cryptocurrencies’ prices.  

To be clear, aside from Strategy, DATCOs are still relatively small players in the digital asset ecosystem, holding just ~$32 billion of cryptocurrencies, or ~0.83% of global market cap. The daily stream of new DATCO announcements may create an exaggerated impression of their current importance. The risks to the market described above are for now largely theoretical, but are worth monitoring as the category continues to grow.     

Conclusion and Outlook 

DATCOs have evolved from a novel capital allocation experiment into a structural source of buying pressure in crypto markets. Their continued rise has reshaped how market participants gain exposure to digital assets, and, increasingly, how they think about the relationship between crypto markets and TradFi.  

Looking ahead, DATCOs will continue to play an even larger role in crypto. This rise is not without risks.  

The reflexive relationship forming between the equity markets that trade these DATCOs’ shares and bitcoin’s price bears close scrutiny. Inflows into BTC treasury companies enable more accretive capital raises and, in turn, more BTC purchases. This cycle has been a very powerful stimulant in a bull market. However, if macro conditions turn risk-off, the stimulant could quickly become a depressant.  

A valid concern is that BTC’s price is becoming increasingly influenced by risk-on flows in public equity markets. Perhaps this was inevitable. If bitcoin really is the most “pristine capital,” why wouldn’t companies buy it whenever and however they can? While DATCOs have broadened institutional access, they may also introduce structural dependencies that undermine bitcoin’s goal of becoming a non-correlated asset.  

The DATCO model functions best when three conditions hold:  

1. Digital asset prices are in a sustained uptrend 

2. Equity premiums remain elevated 

3. Capital markets remain liquid and receptive 

The DATCO landscape will likely keep expanding, both in breadth and sophistication. At Galaxy Research, we expect to see: 

• Continued protocol diversification, with more companies exploring tokens (especially proof-of-stake chains) to generate non-dilutive yield

• Hybrid treasury models that combine operational cash-flowing businesses with capital-efficient digital asset accumulation 

• Further geographic diversification as new firms in emerging markets begin to adopt similar strategies, taking advantage of their local regulatory and capital market conditions 

DATCOs reflect the financialization of crypto (and the crypto-fication of finance). They are imperfect but powerful bridges between two worlds that are increasingly entangled.  

While they don’t in any way replace the core crypto ethos of self-custody and decentralization, they offer a compliant and liquid wrapper for large pools of capital to gain access to digital asset exposure.  

Appendix: List of Companies  

The following tables list companies associated with the Digital Asset Treasury Company (DATCO) model. They include both firms that were analyzed in detail throughout the report as well as others that exhibit similar treasury characteristics but were not formally included in the primary dataset due to differences in strategy. 

These lists should not be interpreted as exhaustive. The universe of companies holding digital assets on their balance sheets is dynamic and expanding, and the DATCO model continues to evolve in form and function. Companies may move into or out of this category over time due to changes in capital strategy. 

The lists are intended to provide directional insight into the breadth and diversity of treasury strategies across public markets, and to serve as references for further research.