Move over MicroStrategy. Ethereum treasury companies are the most aggressive buyers in town.

Ethereum treasuries control 3.5% of all Ether, while Bitcoin treasuries hold 3.4% of the network’s total supply, according to Blockworks Research data.

It’s a minimal difference that reveals big momentum: Ethereum treasuries have tripled their holdings since July while Bitcoin treasuries plateaued.

“I am not surprised,” Max Shannon, senior research associate at Bitwise, told DL News. “I think the percentage of supply accumulated by Ethereum treasuries continues to outpace Bitcoin over the short term.”

A treasury company is one that holds a cryptocurrency — Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP — on its balance sheet as a reserve asset.

In recent months, there’s been a dramatic acceleration in companies that accumulate cryptocurrencies other than Bitcoin.

Solana treasuries exploded in just five months. In late April, companies held almost no Solana tokens. On Wednesday, they held 2.3% of the Solana supply. Ethereum treasuries, meanwhile, have climbed steadily to 3.5% of the Ether supply from just 1% in August.

What’s most impressive, however, is that they’ve accomplished a feat that took Bitcoin treasuries more than five years.

Strategy, the company formerly known as MicroStrategy, began building its $71 billion hoard of Bitcoin in August 2020. In 2024, after years of handsome stock price appreciation, myriad companies started to follow suit.

Ethereum treasuries? These barely existed six months ago. And yet 71 firms now hold $22 billion in Ether, according to Strategic ETH Reserve.

Despite the momentum, the Bitcoin space remains considerably larger than Ethereum. About 184 public firms hold over 1 million Bitcoin worth around $116 billion, according to BitcoinTreasuries.net.

Yield

Why are Ethereum treasuries accumulating faster? Yield.

“Ether generates compounding returns through staking and DeFi real yield — trading, borrowing and lending — while Bitcoin offers no native yield in comparison,” Shannon explained.

That 3% staking yield creates a flywheel effect.

Treasury companies stake their ETH, earn more ETH, then use the additional returns to justify higher stock premiums.

Higher premiums mean they can raise more capital, buy more ETH, stake it, and repeat.

Bitcoin treasuries, on the other hand, can only buy and hold. No staking, no DeFi, and no compounding.

Other analysts have also highlighted the difference.

In July, Jeff Park, head of Alpha Strategies at Bitwise, signaled that Ethereum was carving out a unique and structurally different investment thesis from Bitcoin in the public equity markets.

“Ethereum is a useful asset,” Park said in a July 8 interview on the Wolf of All Streets podcast.

“Bitcoin stores value. But Ethereum is productive — it earns yield.”

Supply

A big component of Ethereum’s appeal is supply dynamics.

Bitcoin’s hard cap of 21 million coins creates scarcity but also limits how many coins a firm can accumulate. Once Strategy and other firms lock up significant amounts of Bitcoin, there’s less to go around.

But Ethereum has no supply cap. New Ether gets issued in perpetuity, meaning treasuries can keep accumulating without hitting a ceiling.

“With no hard cap like BTC, ETH can be steadily accumulated, supporting higher mNAV as investors price in more accumulation of the asset over a longer period of time,” Shannon said.

This structural difference allows Ethereum treasuries to promise indefinite growth while Bitcoin treasuries face eventual supply constraints.

Fiscal dominance

The shift aligns with broader institutional adoption patterns.

In August, VanEck CEO Jan van Eck called Ethereum “the Wall Street token,” while BitMine chairman Tom Lee dubbed it “the biggest macro trade of the decade.”

Their reasoning: stablecoins. More than half of the $300 billion stablecoin market is on Ethereum, and financial institutions have no choice but to build on its rails.

“Because of stablecoins, every bank and financial services company has to have a way of taking in stablecoins,” van Eck said. “Your bank will have to figure it out or you will find another institution to do that.”

Some analysts even predict the booming stablecoin sector will top $500 billion sometime in 2026.

To be sure, just because treasury companies have gobbled up a greater share of available Ethereum than Bitcoin, that doesn’t mean the trend is set in stone.

“Over the long term, BTC should be the staple balance sheet asset and likely overtake Ethereum treasuries,” Shannon told DL News.

“In a period of fiscal dominance, it may serve as the next reserve asset, keeping balance sheets healthy.”

Fiscal dominance refers to when governments run massive deficits that central banks must finance through money printing, fuelling inflation — exactly the scenario Bitcoin was designed to protect against.

Pedro Solimano is DL News’ Buenos Aires-based markets correspondent. Got at a tip? Email him at psolimano@dlnews.com.