For much of the past three years, a predictable cycle has dominated the market: companies announced plans to buy massive volumes of Bitcoin, saw their stock prices rise to a premium, and issued new shares to buy more Bitcoin. This feedback loop has made Bitcoin accumulation seem like an “infinite money problem”: a guaranteed way for public companies to create shareholder value out of thin air.
As we move forward into the first quarter of 2026, this cycle is broken. Recent data shows that approximately 40% of publicly traded Bitcoin Treasuries are now trading at a price below their net asset value (NAV). Simply put, the market now views these companies as a liability, worth less than the market price of the Bitcoin they hold.
This collapse in valuations has drawn strong criticism from institutional veterans. VanEck CEO Jan van Eck recently dismissed the industry as an advertising trend, while veteran analyst Herb Greenberg called the biggest player, Strategy, a “quasi-Ponzi scheme.”
These criticisms highlight a failure in the management of many of these companies. To remain viable, Bitcoin treasury companies must accept that accretive dilution is no longer a sustainable strategy. They must go beyond passive holding and act as disciplined asset managers.
Competing philosophies: the developer versus the asset manager
Today, most Bitcoin treasury companies are divided into two camps, representing fundamentally different business management philosophies: “promoters” and “asset managers.”
Proponents treat Bitcoin as a passive asset to be hoarded. In this model, the primary mission of the company is twofold. First, the company must act as an aggressive defender of the underlying currency and its ecosystem. By investing in community projects and maintaining a constant presence in public discourse, the developer strives to drive up the price of the token and capitalize on the gains from its existing holdings. Second, the promoter must market its own shares to maintain a high premium. When the market values the company significantly higher than the Bitcoin it actually holds, the company can sell new shares at that inflated price to buy more Bitcoin at the normal market rate. This calculated financial maneuver is called accretive dilution.
Together, these strategies create a feedback loop of hype. The Promoter needs the price of Bitcoin to increase to increase its net asset value, and it needs the equity premium to be maintained to continue its accumulation strategy. However, this model is fragile because it relies entirely on external feeling. If the BTC price stagnates or the equity premium disappears – as we see everywhere in 2026 – the developer is left with an unproductive balance sheet and no internal mechanisms for growth.
In contrast, asset managers view Bitcoin as a productive commodity akin to “digital oil.” In the physical world, an oil major like Exxon or Shell doesn’t just sit on reserves and hope for higher prices. They are sophisticated financial operators who treat their inventory as a productive asset. They trade the futures curve to capture premiums and monetize market volatility.
Asset Manager type treasuries apply this same industrial rigor to the digital domain. By using their balance sheet to generate real Bitcoin-denominated returns, they ensure that growth is driven by operational skills, rather than a byproduct of crypto market sentiment. By treating Bitcoin as a commodity to be managed, the asset manager generates a real return through competent management of the asset, not from the continuous issuance of new shares to the public.
The era of accretive dilution is over
The distinction between these two models is no longer academic. One of them stopped working.
The Promoter approach – which relies on issuing shares to fund Bitcoin accumulation – is no longer a viable growth strategy. What once passed for financial sophistication was, in practice, a tactic that depended on unusually favorable market conditions.
Issuing shares at a premium may temporarily increase Bitcoin per share, but it does not create economic returns. It generates no cash flow, no operational benefits and no sustainable compounding mechanism. Its existence is entirely at the discretion of the new investors. When this demand weakens, the strategy collapses.
For much of 2025, this reality has been easy to ignore. Rising Bitcoin prices and abundant liquidity have made accumulation strategies interchangeable. Capital flowed freely, stock premiums rose, and dozens of treasury companies adopted the same principle: buy Bitcoin, promote the narrative, raise more equity, repeat. In this environment, differentiation did not matter.
This is the case now.
As the market matures, Bitcoin Treasuries that rely solely on passive accumulation face a major constraint: they lack an internal mechanism for growth. When every company owns the same asset, holds it the same way, and relies on the same stock market dynamics, there is no basis for sustained outperformance. The model has become commonplace – and investors are increasingly fed up.
Only the largest players – those with exceptional scale, brand recognition and Michael Saylor-level fame – will be able to sustain this approach. For most treasury companies, passive accumulation without active management offers no path to differentiation, resilience, or long-term relevance.
The markets are already reflecting this reality. Nearly half of Bitcoin treasury companies have fallen below mNAV, and most will not recover without a radical change.
Moving from passive storage to active management
To move from promoter to asset manager, companies must go beyond the simple HODL strategy and put the balance sheet to work. This means adopting the tools of professional commodity trading.
One of the main tools is basis trading, in which a company exploits the price difference between the spot price of Bitcoin and the price of the futures contract. By capturing this gap, a company can grow its Bitcoin holdings even when the asset’s price is stable or falling. Additionally, a Bitcoin asset manager uses dynamic options strategies to turn market turbulence into income.
This approach provides a “real return” that does not require selling more shares or finding new investors. It transforms cash from a cost center into a profit center. More importantly, it provides a clear path to increasing Bitcoin per share through operational excellence rather than capital market maneuvering.
Treasury companies must also adapt the way they communicate with investors. Too many Treasury CEOs present themselves as low-budget Michael Saylor impersonators – focusing on narrative amplification, public advocacy, and symbolic accumulation. This is an approach designed to generate hype, not to project prudent financial management.
As investor scrutiny intensifies, CEOs will need to project credibility by explaining how risk is managed, how exposure is structured and how returns are generated under various market conditions. The market will not reward Bitcoin’s loudest cheerleaders; it will reward companies that deploy their assets in the most productive way.
