Good overview of the insanity that is #MichaelSaylor's "buy billions of dollars worth of bitcoin with borrowed money" approach to financial engineering.

> "If #MicroStrategy's strategy is so brilliant, why isn't every company doing it? Should Apple stop making iPhones and just convert its cash to Bitcoin? Should Coca-Cola abandon soda production and become a Bitcoin holding company?"

https://basedtoschi.substack.com/p/inside-microstrategys-bitcoin-pyramid

#GameStop will be “investing” some of the $4.6 billion cash pile it accumulated by dumping #GME shares on retail apes (who are tbh significantly dumber than crypto bros, which is impressive) into bitcoin.

This follows #MichaelSaylor of #MicroStrategy's entreaties to the company a few weeks ago, because pretty clearly Saylor’s #MSTR / #STRK / #STRF ponzi scheme is running out of steam and he desperately needs other people’s money to prop up the scam.

https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2025/03/25/gamestop-to-add-bitcoin-to-balance-sheet

FT Alphaville weighs in on #MicroStrategy's bizarre new "strife" (#STRF) bitcoin accumulation strategy.

> "#MichaelSaylor has pitched it as a way to tap into the vast pool of fixed-income investors who generally prefer stability and predictable returns. Yet Strife offers neither. It exposes investors to bitcoin’s downside (since Strategy’s creditworthiness hinges on its crypto holdings) without giving them any upside if the cryptocurrency soars. The dividend is fixed, so if bitcoin 'moons', Strife holders are left watching from the sidelines. It’s like being invited to an all-you-can-eat buffet but only allowed to smell the food."

> "Buried in the fine print of the prospectus is a crucial detail: the board can suspend dividends altogether. It’s essentially a 'trust me' deal."

https://www.ft.com/content/20984de7-4a63-4919-979f-04245de33592

#Metaplanet, the Japanese company that recently started using the same "borrow as much money as you can to buy bitcoin with debt" approach as #MicroStrategy, has named #EricTrump as the first member of its "Strategic Board of Advisors".

I suspect this increases the odds that the crypto industry will get a bail out if SHTF, though they were already pretty high.

One week ago #MicroStrategy (#MSTR, the world's largest pot of bitcoins masquerading as a publicly traded company) announced they were raising $21 billion (1/3rd of the entire company) via a new "perpetual strike preferred stock" called #STRK to raise cash to pump the price of bitcoin.

Today now suddenly they are announcing they will raise money via yet *another* financial instrument "strife" (#STRF) to pump the price of bitcoin.

absolutely wild. bitcoin cannot be "digital gold" if its price depends on the solvency of a single company (which it now does)

* STRK announcement: https://www.strategy.com/press/strategy-announces-21-billion-strk-at-the-market-program_03-10-2025
* STRF announcement: https://www.strategy.com/press/strategy-announces-proposed-strf-preferred-stock-offering_03-18-2025

#MicroStrategy's “bitcoin strategy” is going fully pyramidal. The company has spent $33 billion on bitcoins now “worth” roughly $41 billion over the past 5 years (at least $7-8 billion of those bought with borrowed money). Now #MichaelSaylor just announced a $21 billion sale of their special new #STRK perpetual strike “stock” (different from the regular stock, which is #MSTR) to buy even more bitcoin. Note that the market cap of MicroStrategy is ~$60 billion, so that's a sale of 1/3rd (sort of - STRK isn't exactly a share of stock).

Paraphrasing Dan Davies
here, something along the lines of “the nature of fraud is to expand until stopped by an external force”…

checking in on who's who at the #WhiteHouseCryptoSummit:
https://x.com/Pledditor/status/1897364240417337352

checking in on #MichaelSaylor now that bitcoin is below $80k and he bought ~$20 billion worth for $95-105k with borrowed money in the past two months:
https://x.com/saylor/status/1895325810942411234

the meeting logs of #DavidSacks and #a16z's "Crypto Task Force" that is I guess now running american financial regulation via the #SEC contain many incredible things, but only a single meeting with anyone trying to advocate for the public interest (#BetterMarkets, who deserve a lot of credit for trying).

* SEC page: https://www.sec.gov/about/crypto-task-force/crypto-task-force-meeting-logs
* archived meeting notes: https://legacy.www.documentcloud.org/app?q=%2Btag%3A%22crypto%20task%20force%22

#MicroStrategy just bought another $2 billion worth of bitcoin with convertible debt (that they will have to pay back despite #MichaelSaylor's blatant lies to the contrary in our new post-regulation era). The price of bitcoin still managed to go down 2% as soon as he announced the purchase.
https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2025/02/24/strategy-adds-20-4k-bitcoin-bringing-stack-to-499k-tokens

California State Teachers Retirement System (#CalSTRS) has started investing in bitcoin (via #MicroStrategy, so they’re paying roughly double the market rate).

What could go wrong?

https://www.theblock.co/post/341230/calstrs-pension-fund-reports-holding-83-million-in-mstr-shares

#MicroStrategy CEO + #Gamestop CEO = hot scammer on scammer action

https://x.com/OccamiCrypto/status/1889009725208981548

gm

forbes has had an absolutely incredible run of putting billionaires on the cover shortly before they go down in a fireball of fraudulence. let's see if they can repeat the trick for #MichaelSaylor...

p.s. truly incredible tagline

serious accounting person and #finreg expert Francine McKenna goes HAM on #MicroStrategy (#MSTR) and #MichaelSaylor’s “giant pot of bitcoins in the sky” investment strategy (if you can call it that).

https://thedig.substack.com/p/microstrategy-part-1-of-answering