Public companies have purchased more Bitcoin than ETFs for three consecutive quarters due to strategic treasury diversification and longer investment horizons. Unlike ETFs, which face daily liquidity demands from traders, corporations can absorb volatility through balance sheet allocations without short-term redemption pressures. This allows them to accumulate during price dips more aggressively than ETF flows, which often correlate with retail sentiment shifts.
Corporate acquisitions are also driven by accounting advantages, including potential tax benefits and inflation hedging. Companies like Figma—which disclosed $70M in Bitcoin ETF holdings in its IPO filing—leverage crypto positions to signal innovation alignment to investors. Such moves contrast with ETFs, where holdings are dispersed across thousands of individual investors with varying risk tolerance.
The trend underscores a divergence in objectives: ETFs primarily serve as speculative instruments, while corporations treat Bitcoin as a strategic reserve asset. This institutional accumulation may reduce circulating supply, potentially amplifying price impacts during demand surges. However, it also concentrates risk, as seen in Celsius’ $4B lawsuit over Bitcoin liquidation losses.
