Strive Raises $750 Million to Fuel Bitcoin Treasury Purchases

Strive Asset Management, a financial services firm co-founded by billionaire Ohio gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, announced Tuesday that it signed a financial arrangement to raise $750 million that will primarily be used to buy Bitcoin. 

Under the private investment public equity or PIPE financing, Strive and Asset Entities, the publicly traded company with which it will merge, can raise as much as an additional $750 million when warrants are exercised, providing up to $1.5 billion in total funds to buy the top crypto asset. 

“Most Bitcoin treasury companies are valued based on multiples to their Bitcoin holdings, which makes sense because their strategies are tied to leveraged beta to Bitcoin,” said Strive CEO Matt Cole, in a statement. “By contrast, our alpha-generating Bitcoin accumulation strategies are designed to drive sustained outperformance relative to Bitcoin itself, which requires a new valuation framework.”

In other words, Strive is attempting to outperform its peer Bitcoin treasury companies using new innovative approaches to accumulating Bitcoin, rather than just using convertible notes, preferred stock, or at-the-market equity offerings popularized by companies like Michael Saylor’s Strategy. 

Both the PIPE investment and the warrants priced ASST at $1.35 per share, a more than 100% premium on the closing share price prior to the merger announcement.  

The financing will unlock Strive’s “first wave” of Bitcoin accumulation strategies, so-called “alpha” strategies which include buying distressed Bitcoin claims like those from Mt. Gox, unlocking discounted cash through acquisitions, and purchasing bottom tranches of structured Bitcoin credit vehicles.

Additionally, the firm opted not to raise any debt financing in this transaction, in order to “preserve maximal leverage capacity in the future.” 

“Strive isn’t a typical ‘Bitcoin treasury company’—we are an alpha-generating asset manager that uses Bitcoin as our store of value and our hurdle rate for capital allocation,” reads the firm’s alpha strategies deck. 

Strive first announced its intentions to merge with Asset Entities and create a Bitcoin treasury in early May. 

Prior to that, the financial services company pushed GameStop to start adding Bitcoin to its coffers, at one point proposing that the gaming company convert all of its cash into BTC. GameStop confirmed its plans in March to start stacking Bitcoin and raised $1.5 billion towards the aim, but has yet to disclose any BTC purchases.

Shares of Asset Entities, ASST, are down nearly 23% on the day to $8.07. The stock, which trades publicly on the Nasdaq Exchange, is up over 1,400% year-to-date. 

Meanwhile, BTC has risen around 0.6% on the day to a current price of $109,710, not far from last Thursday’s new all-time high mark of $111,814, per data from CoinGecko.

Edited by Andrew Hayward