STRC

Jul 10, 2026

Bitcoin’s $10 billion credit market keeps growing after its first major selloff

Bitcoin, Equities Bitcoin Treasuries, Corporate Bitcoin Holdings, Dividend Payments, Leverage Risk, Preferred Shares, SATA, STRC

BitcoinJuly 10, 2026·6 min read

Bitcoin’s $10 billion corporate credit market survived its first major stress test in June when leverage unwinds and margin calls triggered a sharp selloff in preferred shares, yet dividend payments continued and new issuers are advancing plans for yield products across multiple regions. For institutional investors, the episode clarifies both the structural risks and operational resilience of using corporate Bitcoin reserves as collateral for debt-like securities.

Preferred shares issued by Bitcoin treasuries fell as much as 25% below par value in June as leverage-driven margin calls forced liquidations across STRC and SATA securities.
Secondary market volumes reached record levels during the selloff, and dividend payments to holders continued uninterrupted despite the price collapse and stress across the sector.
New issuers in the US, Europe and Asia are actively planning additional yield-paying products, signaling sustained institutional demand despite the June volatility and proof-of-concept for the asset class.

$10B+ Total size of corporate Bitcoin credit market as stress test triggered wider institutional attention and new product development
25% Maximum drawdown for STRC preferred shares below par value during June liquidation cascade and margin call wave
$60K Bitcoin price level in June that triggered cascade of selling pressure across corporate Bitcoin holdings and tied securities

Bitcoin’s emerging market for corporate-backed preferred shares and debt-like instruments proved more durable than early skeptics expected after enduring its first material selloff.

The $10 billion market in securities tied to corporate Bitcoin reserves faced a genuine stress test in June when leverage unwinds and falling cryptocurrency prices triggered margin calls that cascaded into forced selling, sending the largest instruments 25% below their stated par values. Yet the market structure held.

Dividend payments to shareholders continued without interruption, trading volumes in secondary markets hit all-time highs as investors repositioned, and corporate treasuries, far from retreating, continued purchasing additional Bitcoin.

That combination of operational continuity and sustained demand has already attracted new issuers preparing to launch competing products across North America, Europe and Asia, suggesting that institutional investors are treating the June episode not as a warning of terminal fragility but as proof that the asset class can absorb real stress.

MicroStrategy and Strive’s preferred shares collapsed 25% as borrowed money forced rapid liquidations

The June selloff exposed a structural vulnerability that had built up silently over months. MicroStrategy, the largest publicly traded Bitcoin holder with over 800,000 BTC on its balance sheet, and the Bitcoin treasury firm Strive had both raised capital by issuing preferred shares, $100 par value securities with fixed or floating dividend yields and no maturity date.

The structure appealed to issuers because it funded Bitcoin purchases without heavy reliance on equity dilution or traditional debt covenants. For investors, these instruments offered yield substantially above conventional fixed-income returns without requiring direct Bitcoin ownership.

MicroStrategy’s STRC shares and Strive’s SATA emerged as the two largest instruments in the market, trading in relatively tight ranges around $100 par value for extended periods. That apparent stability attracted leveraged investors. Some market participants borrowed money to amplify their positions, betting that consistent dividend income would exceed their financing costs.

The trade remained profitable as long as share prices held steady and Bitcoin volatility stayed contained. When Bitcoin fell below $60,000 in mid-June and broader selling pressure accelerated across cryptocurrency-linked equities and securities, that assumption fractured.

STRC collapsed to approximately $75, a 25% discount to par, as margin calls forced leveraged holders to sell into a deteriorating bid. SATA declined to around $88, also under pressure from its own market dynamics and spillover from the broader deleveraging wave. Yet neither issuer suspended dividend payments to shareholders or defaulted on their obligations.

Record trading volumes and unbroken dividends signaled structural integrity despite the crash

The resilience of the market during forced liquidations and price discovery surprised even institutional observers who had warned about the risks. Secondary market volumes for preferred shares reached all-time highs as investors aggressively repositioned during the selloff, with the price declines attracting value buyers and existing holders taking losses.

Critically, MicroStrategy and Strive both maintained scheduled dividend distributions despite the acute stress, demonstrating that the underlying Bitcoin reserves and cash flows could support obligations even when preferred share valuations fell sharply.

That operational continuity mattered far more than the intra-month price movement. A failure to pay dividends or a suspension of distributions would have signaled that the structures were hollow or that corporate Bitcoin holdings could not reliably service the debt-like securities issued against them.

Instead, the market experienced what BitcoinTreasuries.net characterized as the sector’s first meaningful stress test, and the infrastructure held. Corporate treasuries did not halt Bitcoin purchases in response to the selling pressure.

Index-tracking funds and long-term institutional holders of Bitcoin used the dislocation to accumulate additional holdings at lower prices, providing consistent demand that prevented the spiral from becoming truly self-reinforcing.

The market also quickly repriced and stabilized, with shares recovering toward par as panic sentiment receded and investors recognized that dividend obligations remained sound.

New issuers across three continents are preparing preferred shares and yield products despite June volatility

The most telling sign that the market treats June as a learning event rather than a cautionary tale is the pipeline of new entrants.

Prospective Bitcoin treasury companies and cryptocurrency-adjacent firms in the United States, Europe and Asia are advancing concrete plans to issue preferred shares, dividend-bearing notes, and other yield-producing debt-like instruments backed by corporate Bitcoin reserves.

These are not speculative proposals, issuers are in late-stage planning and regulatory discussions with the explicit goal of launching products within the next 12 to 24 months.

The motivation is straightforward: institutional investors have shown consistent demand for yield-bearing instruments tied to Bitcoin holdings, particularly among portfolio managers seeking uncorrelated return streams and those with mandates to generate income from alternative assets.

The June selloff did not destroy that demand; it clarified the risk profile and forced issuers to think more carefully about leverage management and liquidity buffers. New entrants are studying how MicroStrategy and Strive managed the stress and are designing structures with tighter leverage limits, deeper market depth, and more conservative dividend-to-collateral ratios.

That institutional appetite remains strong despite the volatility. Asset managers overseeing corporate treasuries, pension funds with Bitcoin allocations, and family offices managing alternative asset portfolios have all indicated interest in new preferred share offerings.

The current market concentration, with STRC and SATA representing the largest instruments, has created scarcity value that new issuers hope to capture by offering size, flexibility and diversified underlying collateral.

Regulatory approvals in multiple jurisdictions are advancing, suggesting that governments are treating corporate Bitcoin credit as a legitimate asset class rather than an experimental or frivolous segment.

Leverage concentration in preferred shares remains the primary vulnerability institutional investors must monitor

The June episode established that the market structure is viable but also highlighted a specific point of failure: leverage concentration in a small number of securities.

When STRC and SATA represented disproportionate positions in the preferred share market and attracted significant borrowed capital, a modest decline in Bitcoin prices cascaded rapidly into margin calls that compressed valuations far more sharply than the underlying collateral had moved.

A $60,000 Bitcoin price, a meaningful but not catastrophic decline from historical highs, triggered a 25% draw-down in preferred share value because of the leverage multiplier.

That vulnerability will persist until the market becomes larger and more diverse. If four or five major issuers compete for capital across preferred shares with varying risk profiles, leverage will be spread across more instruments and margin calls in one product will not force as rapid liquidation waves.

Institutional investors betting on this market should monitor two specific metrics: the total size of leveraged positions in preferred shares as reported by prime brokers and clearing firms, and the concentration of collateral in the largest two or three instruments.

A re-accumulation of leverage to June 2024 levels, coupled with narrow secondary market depth, would recreate the conditions for another sharp drawdown.

The availability of higher Bitcoin prices and stronger dividend yields has already begun attracting new capital into the sector, likely reducing leverage ratios compared to June as a percentage of total positions.

Institutional investors

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Jul 10, 2026

STRC, SATA Hit Record $10B Monthly Trading High Despite Price Drop Below Par

Blockchain Bitcoin Treasuries, BTC, Corporate Adoption, Preferred Shares, SATA, STRC, Trading Volume

BitcoinJuly 10, 2026·5 min read

Bitcoin-backed preferred shares STRC and SATA shattered monthly trading records with combined volume exceeding $10 billion in June, even as both instruments traded below par value during a sharp Bitcoin drawdown. This stress test demonstrates institutional appetite for yield-generating crypto products persists through volatility, signaling maturing market structure for digital credit instruments.

STRC generated $8.7 billion in June trading volume, a 20.8% increase from May’s $7.2 billion amid BTC decline to $57,000
Both STRC and SATA fell below their $100 par value starting June 18, triggering margin calls and forced liquidations among leveraged traders
Over half of surveyed investors purchased STRC or SATA after the decline, with 84% holding positions throughout the volatility

$10B+ Combined monthly trading volume for STRC and SATA in June, highest on record
847,363 BTC Holdings of Strategy at average acquisition cost near $75,651, backing STRC obligations
84% Of surveyed investors who did not sell either preferred stock during the June 18 decline

Strategy’s STRC and Strive’s SATA, perpetual preferred shares backed by Bitcoin holdings, posted their strongest month of trading activity in June despite a significant cryptocurrency downturn that pushed both instruments into discount territory.

Combined volumes exceeded $10 billion for the first time on record, with STRC alone accounting for $8.7 billion and SATA contributing $1.5 billion, according to data from BitcoinTreasuries.net.

The trading surge occurred as Bitcoin fell near $57,000, marking a critical test of whether digital credit products can retain institutional support during market stress rather than benefiting solely from bull-market enthusiasm.

STRC Volume Surge Reflects Growing Institutional Adoption of Bitcoin Yield Products

STRC’s $8.7 billion in June volume represented a 20.8% increase from May’s $7.2 billion, extending a consistent acceleration throughout the first half of 2026. April had recorded $7.8 billion, while March delivered $7.8 billion following a 159.1% jump from February’s $2.2 billion.

The upward trajectory signals institutional money entering Bitcoin-backed securities as an asset class rather than treating them as speculative plays tied to short-term price movements.

Looking at the longer pattern, January through May activity shows how the market has matured from nascent volumes. January recorded $2.4 billion, December 2025 saw $1.2 billion, and February bounced back to $2.2 billion before momentum accelerated.

This progression indicates that as issuers scaled their offerings and market participants gained familiarity with the mechanics of digital credit products, trading infrastructure and liquidity deepened considerably.

The June figures now dwarf earlier months by a factor of three to four times, suggesting either new capital classes entering or existing participants dramatically increasing position sizes.

Strategy’s ability to move $8.7 billion monthly in a single security underscores how effectively the firm has marketed these instruments to institutions seeking yield on Bitcoin holdings without selling the underlying asset.

Margin Calls and Liquidations Drive June Downturn Below Par Value

On June 18, both STRC and SATA dropped below their $100 par value as Bitcoin declined sharply, triggering a stress scenario that had never been formally tested in the market. BitcoinTreasuries.net identified margin calls as the primary driver of liquidations among leveraged traders who had positioned themselves to profit from continued trading near par.

This mechanism revealed a structural vulnerability in the preferred stock ecosystem: traders using leverage assumed price stability around the $100 mark rather than pricing in tail-risk scenarios.

STRC fell as low as $75 before recovering to approximately $87 by July 2, while SATA stabilized near $97 after the decline. The $25 drawdown from par for STRC represented a significant test of investor confidence, yet the recovery trajectory and trading volume through the downturn suggested the panic selling did not accelerate beyond initial forced liquidations.

This contrasts with traditional equity markets, where margin calls often trigger cascading selloffs as leveraged positions unwind in rapid succession.

The critical institutional question centers on whether these instruments traded below par because market participants had genuinely repriced the creditworthiness of the issuers or simply because leveraged traders faced forced selling.

BitcoinTreasuries.net addressed this directly, noting that Strategy holds 847,363 BTC acquired at an average cost of approximately $75,651, far below Bitcoin’s June trading range. At those holdings and acquisition costs, Strategy’s solvency position had not materially deteriorated despite the temporary discount.

Investor Survey Reveals Contrarian Positioning Through the Liquidation Event

A BitcoinTreasuries.net investor survey found that 52% of respondents purchased STRC or SATA after June 18, the precise moment when margin calls were forcing other traders to exit. This buying pressure from institutional and qualified investors directly counteracted the forced selling, suggesting a bifurcation between leveraged traders and buy-and-hold yield seekers.

More broadly, 84% of survey respondents held their positions throughout the decline, indicating that most market participants had not structured their STRC and SATA holdings on margin in the first place.

When asked whether the price decline represented a significant concern, more than half of respondents indicated it was not, framing the temporary discount as a buying opportunity rather than a credit event. This perspective aligns with the dividend safety analysis: none of the preferred stock issuers had missed payments, and no credit rating changes had occurred among major issuers as of mid-June.

The survey specifically noted that Strategy’s dividend obligation should be evaluated as a cash flow question rather than a solvency question, given the massive Bitcoin backing.

The instinct after June 18 is to ask whether STRC and SATA are safe. That is the wrong question. Strategy holds 847,363 BTC acquired at an average cost of approximately $75,651. The dividend obligation is a cash flow question, not a solvency question.

BitcoinTreasuries.net Corporate Adoption Report

This framing reflects how institutional perspectives on digital credit products differ fundamentally from traditional equity or bond analysis, where temporary price declines can signal underlying deterioration in issuer quality.

Strategy and Strive Command 78% and 75% Confidence in Institutional Investor Rankings

When asked to rank digital credit issuers by perceived safety and issuance potential, institutional survey respondents showed strong concentration of confidence among the top three names.

Strategy led with 78.4% of respondents ranking it first, followed by Strive at 74.5%, and Metaplanet at 49%. This hierarchy reflects both the absolute scale of assets held by Strategy and Strive as well as market perception of execution quality and transparency around Bitcoin custody and dividend mechanics.

Forward-looking expectations for new issuance suggest Strategy commands the greatest institutional appetite for future digital credit products. Respondents most commonly projected between $10 billion and $30 billion in additional STRC issuance by the end of 2027, positioning Strategy as the dominant player in this emerging product category.

Strive ranked second with expectations for $2 billion to $5 billion in new issuance over the same period. This concentration of issuance expectations among two firms contrasts sharply with traditional equity or bond markets, where new issuance typically distributes more evenly across a larger competitive set.

Metaplanet, Smarter Web Company, and Bitmine followed in the institutional confidence rankings, suggesting a secondary tier of issuers that have gained credibility but have not yet achieved the scale or brand recognition of the market leaders.

For institutional investors, this tiering matters because it affects liquidity depth and the ability to build large positions without moving markets or signaling outsized bets on individual issuers.

The next major test for STRC and SATA will arrive when Bitcoin experiences another significant decline or institutional credit conditions tighten, forcing another evaluation of

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Jun 17, 2026

Michael Saylor Maps Out Bitcoin-Backed ‘Digital Asset Stack’ With Yield Layer

Bitcoin, DeFi Bitcoin Collateral, Bitcoin Treasury, Digital Asset Stack, Institutional Crypto, Michael Saylor, STRC, Tokenized Finance

BitcoinJune 17, 2026·4 min read

MicroStrategy CEO Michael Saylor has outlined a four-layer “Digital Asset Stack” that positions Bitcoin as the foundation for a broader ecosystem of credit, yield and equity instruments, a framework that could reshape how institutions structure Bitcoin-backed financial products if adopted at scale. The model moves beyond simple corporate treasury holdings to propose a full capital structure, but remains a conceptual thesis rather than an approved retail offering, leaving key questions about regulatory acceptance and market viability unresolved.

Saylor proposes four-layer stack with Bitcoin as base collateral, topped by credit, yield and equity instruments
Framework references 8% yield target as conceptual goal, not an approved or live retail product today
Model treats Bitcoin as pristine collateral for institutional financial instruments, pending regulatory and market validation

4 Distinct layers in Saylor’s proposed digital asset stack architecture
8% Yield target described as conceptual framework, not approved product specification
Bitcoin Base layer functioning as digital capital and pristine collateral foundation

Michael Saylor is expanding the corporate Bitcoin treasury argument into a structural model for tokenized finance. Rather than simply advocating that companies hold BTC on their balance sheets, the MicroStrategy CEO has laid out a comprehensive “Digital Asset Stack” that uses Bitcoin as the foundation for an entire capital structure.

The framework proposes layered financial instruments built on top of pristine Bitcoin collateral, with credit products, yield-bearing assets and equity-like exposure occupying distinct tiers above the base layer.

The thesis reflects a maturation in how institutional players are thinking about Bitcoin’s role beyond price appreciation or treasury diversification, positioning it instead as the collateral backbone for new forms of digital finance.

Saylor’s Four-Layer Model Places Bitcoin at Foundation of Digital Finance System

The stack architecture begins with Bitcoin as “digital capital” and pristine collateral at the base. This foundation layer treats BTC not as a speculative asset but as a settlement and reserve medium analogous to traditional cash collateral in institutional finance. Above that sits a digital credit layer, where credit instruments and debt products would be issued against Bitcoin backing.

Saylor references Strategy’s own capital structures as an example of how income-producing credit could connect to Bitcoin-backed assets, though the full mechanics of these instruments remain in early conceptual stage.

The second tier introduces an intermediate yield layer, designed to offer lower volatility and more predictable returns than direct Bitcoin exposure. The framework includes an 8% yield figure, though this should be read as a conceptual target for the risk-return profile rather than a guaranteed or approved product specification.

Above the yield layer sits a top tier of digital equity exposure, positioned to absorb greater volatility while offering leveraged upside potential. This tiered structure allows different investor classes and risk appetites to access Bitcoin-backed instruments at appropriate levels, a core principle in traditional capital markets that has been absent from most crypto financial products.

The model represents a shift from viewing Bitcoin primarily as a price-volatile asset to treating it as institutional-grade collateral capable of anchoring an entire financial system.

Yield Language Remains Conceptual, Not an Approved Retail Product

A critical distinction must be drawn between Saylor’s framework as a theoretical capital structure and any actual product currently available to retail or institutional investors. The source material describes portions of the system as “barely built” and explicitly conceptual rather than market-ready.

This precision matters in crypto markets, where yield language has historically preceded product failures and regulatory enforcement actions. Previous cycles saw numerous platforms promise high returns on Bitcoin-backed instruments only to collapse under inadequate collateral, poor risk controls or outright fraud.

Treating Saylor’s 8% figure as a mere illustrative target rather than a performance guarantee protects investors from misreading architectural ambition as validated product engineering.

The framework should be understood as a corporate finance thesis that may influence how MicroStrategy and similar Bitcoin treasury companies structure their own capital stacks and debt instruments. It may also shape broader conversations within institutional finance about how Bitcoin collateral could be tokenized and layered to serve multiple investor classes.

But this is foundational thinking, not implementation. No fully disclosed, SEC-reviewed Bitcoin-backed credit or yield product matching this specification has been launched or approved for general retail distribution. The language reflects where Saylor believes institutional finance should go, not where it currently stands.

Regulatory Path for Bitcoin-Backed Credit Products Remains Uncharted

The central open question is whether regulators and capital markets participants will treat Bitcoin-backed credit and yield instruments as legitimate institutional products or continue to regard them as high-risk crypto experiments. Traditional securities regulators have shown caution around cryptocurrency collateral, particularly in credit products where losses can cascade through leverage.

The SEC’s approach to Bitcoin ETFs, approving spot vehicles while maintaining stricter standards around futures and leveraged products, suggests a tiered comfort level based on custody, transparency and underlying asset volatility.

A Bitcoin-backed credit instrument would need to demonstrate similar rigor in collateral management, pricing disclosure and risk controls to gain institutional acceptance.

MicroStrategy itself operates with significant leverage against Bitcoin holdings, a structure that works when Bitcoin appreciates but creates stress in downturns. Formalizing this into a broader debt market requires clear answers to questions about margin requirements, liquidation mechanics, and how Bitcoin price declines would affect credit instrument seniority and recovery.

The company has not indicated when or whether it plans to file formal product specifications or seek regulatory approval for discrete yield-bearing instruments.

Industry observers will be watching whether Strategy moves toward official product documentation, whether other Bitcoin treasury companies adopt similar frameworks, and how the regulatory dialogue evolves around Bitcoin as collateral for credit markets.

The next concrete test will be whether this language translates into filed debt instruments, formal product disclosures or credit offerings with clear collateral specifications and regulatory clearance. Saylor has not announced a timeline for formalizing any component of the stack, and MicroStrategy’s typical practice is to operate leverage through conventional debt markets rather than tokenized instruments. The question of whether Bitcoin-backed credit products will move from theoretical framework to regulated market instruments, and under what jurisdictional regime that might occur, remains the defining next step.

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Apr 29, 2026

Michael Saylor Keynote: The Birth of Digital Credit

Bitcoin, Editor's Choice, Institutional, Real World Assets Bitcoin 2026, Capital Markets, Digital Credit, Michael Saylor, MicroStrategy, Preferred Stock, STRC

Michael Saylor’s Bitcoin 2026 Keynote — CCS Exclusive

CCS Exclusive · Keynote Coverage

Michael Saylor Keynote:
The Birth of
Digital Credit

Michael Saylor took the Bitcoin 2026 stage to declare that a new era in capital markets has begun — and that Strategy’s STRC has already become the most liquid preferred stock on Earth.

By CCS Editorial Desk · Bitcoin Conference 2026

Exclusive Analysis

STRC

“Digital credit is a killer application of Bitcoin. We expect to sell tens of billions — then hundreds of billions — then trillions of dollars of digital credit.” — Michael Saylor, Bitcoin 2026

Full Keynote · Courtesy of Bitcoin Magazine

STRC by the numbers — as presented at Bitcoin 2026

$8.5B AUM

Reached in under 9 months, making STRC the world’s largest preferred stock

11.5% Yield

Tax-deferred dividend — equivalent to ~24% in a high-tax city like New York

2.7× Sharpe Ratio

5× better than the best competing credit instrument; beats Nvidia’s 1.89

$38B Run Rate

April demand annualized — from zero in under twelve months

Chapter I · The Big Idea

Engineering Credit the Way Satoshi Engineered Money

Michael Saylor opened his keynote at Bitcoin 2026 not with a price prediction but with an architectural argument. Just as Satoshi Nakamoto assembled proof-of-work, public-key cryptography, and peer-to-peer networking into ideal capital — a non-sovereign, bearer store of value without counterparty risk — Saylor claims to have done the same for credit.

The vehicle is STRC, the perpetual preferred equity issued by Strategy. Its building blocks are, individually, unremarkable: listed public companies, preferred equity structures, monthly variable dividends, return-of-capital tax treatment, shelf registrations, and ATM programs. Each has existed for decades or longer. The breakthrough, Saylor argues, was the combination — marrying them to a Bitcoin balance sheet to produce what he calls digital credit: liquid, transparent, homogeneous, accessible to any retail account, and carrying no fee.

“Bitcoin represents ideal capital,” he told the crowd. “Digital credit is ideal credit. We engineered it the same way.”

“The world’s built on capital. The world runs on credit. Our company strategy converts capital into credit.”

Chapter II · Stripping Risk from a Volatile Asset

How You Extract an 11% Yield from a 40-Volatility Asset

The mathematics Saylor presented are deliberately simple. Bitcoin has compounded at roughly 38% per year over the past five years — far above gold at 16%, real estate at 6%, or money markets at 3%. Since you cannot pay a credit dividend higher than the expected return of the underlying capital, those asset classes impose a ceiling on what any asset-backed credit product can yield. Bitcoin’s ceiling is the highest of any mainstream asset.

Strategy’s approach is to over-collateralize: at 4-to-1 or 5-to-1 collateral ratios, Bitcoin would need to fall 80% before a credit investor loses a dollar of principal. The capital investor absorbs all of that downside; the credit investor sits safely behind them. Volatility — Bitcoin’s notorious 40-point swings — is mathematically stripped away when you target a par value and pay out only the first slice of return.

In Saylor’s framing, the instrument performs “signal processing on a financial signal.” The first 11% of expected return goes to STRC holders. Everything above that — the excess volatility, the excess return — flows to the common equity. Three distinct products emerge from one underlying asset: digital capital (Bitcoin), digital credit (STRC), and digital equity (Strategy common stock).

Chapter III · A Product That Didn’t Exist

The Largest Preferred in the World — Before Its First Birthday

Saylor displayed a chart of the ten largest preferred stocks globally. STRC sits atop a list that includes preferred issues from Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JPMorgan, and Fannie Mae. Many of those instruments, he noted, are effectively impossible for retail investors to find, let alone trade — some are legally restricted to institutional buyers, and their tickers are nearly ungoogle-able.

STRC is not merely the largest. By Saylor’s presentation, it is 25× more liquid than the next-best preferred stock, turning over roughly 4.5% of its AUM in daily trading volume. Liquidity has grown by a factor of eight in five months. At the time of the conference, daily liquidity was approaching $400 million.

Instrument	Sharpe Ratio	Est. Yield	Liquidity	Tax Treatment
STRC (Strategy)	2.7	11.5%	~$400M / day	Return of capital (deferred)
Nvidia (NVDA)	1.89	—	Very high	Capital gains / ordinary
Top bank preferreds	~0.5	5–7%	Low–moderate	Qualified dividend
Private credit funds	<0.5	8.5%	Illiquid	Fully taxable
Money markets	Negative	3–4%	Daily	Fully taxable
S&P 500 Index	<1	1–2% div	Very high	Qualified dividend

Chapter IV · The Comeback of Preferred Capital

A 100-Year Gap, Closed

One of the more historically grounded passages in Saylor’s keynote was his argument that STRC represents less of an innovation and more of a revival. In the 19th century, preferred stocks financed the railroads and much of the early industrial revolution, comprising as much as 20–40% of corporate capital structures. Over the course of the 20th century, preferred equity fell out of use. Regulatory changes, tax policy, and the rise of bond markets pushed them to the institutional margins.

“Now in the 21st century,” Saylor said, “we’ve reintroduced the idea of preferred credit back into the capital markets.” The difference, he argues, is that this time the underlying collateral is not railroad track or factory equipment — it is Bitcoin, the highest-performing asset class of the last decade.

The shelf registration innovation amplifies this point. Before Strategy began issuing digital credit instruments, the largest shelf registration ever executed on a credit instrument globally was $500 million. Strategy has now filed a $21 billion shelf registration for STRC alone — a figure roughly 40 times the previous world record, according to Saylor.

Chapter V · Adoption and the Three-Million-Household Mark

From Institutional Indexes to Robin Hood Retail

Saylor’s growth numbers border on the incredible. Monthly demand for STRC fell to roughly $80 million in February during a sharp Bitcoin drawdown, then surged to $1.5 billion in March and $3.5 billion in April — a monthly demand run rate that annualizes to $38 billion. “How many products in the world,” he asked, “went from zero to $20 billion a year in their first year? There aren’t many.”

Adoption is broad. By Saylor’s count, roughly 80% of STRC is held in retail accounts — more than 120,000 distinct accounts, across E*Trade, Robinhood, Fidelity, and Charles Schwab. He estimates that approximately three million households are currently benefiting from the instrument.

Institutional adoption is accelerating in parallel. BlackRock and Van Eck, two of the largest credit fund managers in the world, both hold STRC as the third-largest position in their respective credit indexes, representing 2–6% of fund assets. As money flows into those indexes, it flows into STRC — and from there, into Bitcoin. Additionally, 21Shares has already launched an STRC-embedded ETF in Europe, while Strive is preparing a U.S.-listed digital yield fund.

Chapter VI · The Layer 3 Vision

Stable Coins, Streaming Dividends, and the $200 Trillion Endgame

The second half of Saylor’s keynote zoomed out to what he calls the “Layer 3” opportunity. If Bitcoin is Layer 1 (the capital asset) and STRC is Layer 2 (digital credit), then Layer 3 is the ecosystem of products built on top: tokenized STRC, ETFs, bank accounts, stable coins, and private funds that use STRC as their yield engine.

He described companies already building in this space — Apex, Saturn, and Hermetica — all constructing Bitcoin-backed yield products or stablecoin-backed yield products on top of Strategy’s infrastructure. Tokenized STRC grew from nothing to over $200 million in just four weeks, and Saylor said he expected it to cross $1 billion in AUM within weeks.

As a concrete near-term move, Saylor announced that Strategy would seek shareholder approval to shift STRC from monthly to semi-monthly dividend payments. The physics analogy he employed was apt: doubling the frequency of a signal takes it an octave higher — higher fidelity, tighter oscillation, lower volatility. If approved, the first semi-monthly dividend payment would arrive July 15th, making STRC the only stock in the world paying a semi-monthly dividend out of roughly 24,000 publicly listed companies.

The long arc of Saylor’s vision: drive Bitcoin to $10 million per coin, build a $200 trillion network, and give every person on Earth access to a high-yield digital savings account yielding 8–10% annually. “Fix the money, fix the world,” he concluded. “Digital credit is the next killer application to fix the money.”