Shares of MicroStrategy, which derives most of its value from its Bitcoin holdings, rose 10% on Wednesday, bringing the three-day gain to 40%. Mr. Saylor is his MicroStrategy's largest investor, holding his 12% of the company's stock. He also disclosed personal ownership of 17,732 Bitcoins in 2020.
In total, Mr. Saylor is about $700 million richer than he was on Sunday.
Between Saylor's MicroStrategy management and Bitcoin, his holdings increased from $2.27 billion at the beginning of the week to $2.96 billion on Wednesday.
A MicroStrategy spokesperson said the company does not comment on Saylor's personal finances.
The big catalyst this week was Bitcoin's rise to its highest price since November 2021. Bitcoin rose from $51,500 early Monday to around $64,000 on Wednesday. After a glitch in Coinbase's app left many users with zero balances in their accounts, the value returned to around $60,000 later that day.
Thaler, who founded MicroStrategy in 1989 and still serves as the company's chairman, is one of Bitcoin's leading evangelists and has written a book about cryptocurrencies in 2023 titled “What is Money?” He is a co-author of
MicroStategy operates in enterprise software and cloud-based services, but its ownership in Bitcoin effectively makes it the world's largest cryptocurrency distributor.
The company announced on Monday that it acquired an additional 3,000 Bitcoins between February 15th and February 25th for a total of $155 million. MicroStrategy, along with its subsidiaries, currently holds approximately 193,000 Bitcoins worth nearly $12 billion.
MicroStrategy announced plans to invest in Bitcoin in mid-2020, saying in an earnings call that it would invest $200 million in the next 12 months in “one or more alternative assets,” which could include digital currencies like Bitcoin. He announced that he would invest $50 million. The company's market capitalization at the time was approximately $1.1 billion. It is now worth more than $16 billion.
In MicroStrategy's latest earnings call on February 7, Chief Financial Officer Andrew Kang said that the company is “the world's largest Bitcoin holding company, and we have the highest confidence in our Bitcoin acquisition strategy.” We have continued to work on it.”
MicroStrategy stock is up 52% this year after soaring 346% in 2023.
clock: MicroStrategy CEO says Bitcoin price has surpassed $50,000
