Morning Minute: Strategy CEO Says Selling The Bottom Was Correct Move

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt.

GM!

Today’s top news:

• Crypto majors rebound 1-3% as bonds cool; BTC at $77.9k
• BTC ETF inflows flip positive with $100M; ETH ETFs break 3-week inflow streak
• Kraken parent Payward pushes IPO to Q2 2027 at earliest
• Binance records $1B in stablecoin inflow in August, reversing 2026 trend
• PONS soars 40% and enters top 100 coins by market cap

🔁 Strategy CEO Says Selling The Bottom Was Correct Move

Strategy sold 6,916 BTC across four tranches from late June through mid-August at a weighted average near $62,200. Last week it bought 4,603 BTC at an average of $80,318. CEO Phong Le went on Bloomberg Crypto on Wednesday and said both were the right call.

His argument is that Bitcoin’s price wasn’t the input. The company sold to fund STRC dividends when issuing shares had gotten expensive, and it’s buying now because MSTR trades at a premium again. During the two-month pause it took assets to $72 billion, built roughly $7 billion in dollar reserves, and cut net debt from about $7 billion to zero. A stronger balance sheet makes equity cheaper to issue, which makes buying Bitcoin with it work.

Le also pushed back on the size of the story. The sale was under 1% of holdings, which have grown 25% to 30% this year, and the company now holds 845,050 BTC worth roughly $65.4 billion. He went further to say that a one-way accumulator isn’t a full operating company, and buying and selling Bitcoin, equity, and preferreds is what makes one. He called Strategy a two-way capital management company.

The key mechanism here is STRC, the variable-rate preferred that Strategy adjusts to keep near its $100 stated value. When it slipped below par in June, the funding route closed and Bitcoin became their only shot to try for a repeg (it still hasn’t repegged by the way). Le is right that it was a financing decision. He’s also describing a company whose Bitcoin purchases depend on its stock premium, which depends on Bitcoin. It’s a difficult 3-body problem to manage and clearly they’ve opted to give MSTR equity holders the worst deal. But perhaps in a bull market, all the moves pay off in spades. Hopefully we’ll find out soon enough…

🌎 Macro Crypto and Markets

• Crypto majors were green up 2-3%; BTC +1.3% at $77.9k; ETH +1% at $2,400; SOL +2% at $101; HYPE even at $82
• Top alt movers include PONS (+36%), ARB (+25%) and LIT (+10%)
• Oil +3% at $93; Gold +2 at $4,470
• Stock futures are flat as bond yields cool; DOW +0.1%, Nasdaq -0.2%
• Glassnode said Bitcoin stays range-bound until it absorbs the $83,000 to $86,000 band, where roughly 1.05 million coins held by long-term holders sit near breakeven, with $62,000 to $65,000 as the floor
• Kraken parent Payward pushed its IPO to the second quarter of 2027 at the earliest, extending a freeze that began in March after a November 2025 confidential filing
• Binance recorded over $1B in stablecoin inflows in August, reversing a trend that had seen $6B+ exodus previously in 2026
• HYPE entered a US crypto index ETF for the first time, joining Hashdex’s NCIQ at a 3.4% weighting as the fund’s fifth-largest holding behind Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, and Solana
• New Jersey asked the Supreme Court to rule on whether states can police prediction markets’ sports contracts, the first such petition after the Third and Ninth Circuits split on the question
• Two Thai businessmen sued Tether over a $42.4 million USDT freeze they say came at a Homeland Security agent’s informal request, more than three months before any seizure warrant was issued

Corporate Treasuries & ETFs

• The Bitcoin ETFs saw $101M in net inflows on Wednesday; the ETH ETFs saw $48M in outflows, breaking a 3-week green streak

Meme Coin Tracker

• Meme leaders were green up 2-4%; DOGE +3%, SHIB +2%, PEPE +2%, PENGU even, TRUMP +2%, SPX -3%
• Robinhood chain leaders were very green as Pons soars; PONS +43%; Cashcat +1%; AI +25%; Index +72%; Microduck +25%; Nudes, Peptides and Hotdog were other big runners
• Solana was led by Useless +50% and TripleT +30%; Ansem even at $240M

💰 Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker

• Robinhood Chain did $4M in chain revenue for the first time, while DEX volumes ($1.8B) and RWA chain value ($100M) hit new ATHs
• Pons hit new ATHs in daily trading volume ($544M) and daily revenue ($1.1M) whild adding $880k to its buyback fund
• Pump.fun did $1.8M in daily revenue while Hyperliquid did $1.73M

🚚 What is happening in NFTs?

• NFT leaders were mostly flat; Punks -1% at 31.5 ETH, BAYC -1% at 7.45 ETH, Pudgy +1% at 3.9 ETH
• Argonauts (+35%), Identity MD (+40%) and Chain Mancers (+20%) led top movers