Corporate Bitcoin Buying Slows as Total Holdings Reach Record High

Corporate appetite for Bitcoin cooled in October, even as total holdings across companies, governments, and ETFs reached their highest level on record, a sign the sector is shifting from rapid accumulation to a more defensive stance across balance sheets.

Public and private firms added 14,447 BTC during the month, the smallest increase this year, according to an October report from online tracker BitcoinTreasuries.net.

The slowdown marks a sharp pullback from September, when corporate treasuries purchased more than 38,000 coins amid rising prices and stronger market sentiment.

Yet overall ownership continued to rise. Total tracked holdings reached 4.05 million BTC at the end of October, valued at roughly $444 billion. 

Public companies accounted for just over 1.05 million BTC, while governments held 644,329 BTC, and ETFs and exchanges held another 1.54 million BTC.

Selling, meanwhile, remained minimal, with companies offloading only 39 coins during the month, the report found.

Funding has become harder to secure as share valuations compress and risk premiums rise, forcing companies to rely on costly preferred-share offerings or credit lines rather than cheap equity issuance.

The deceleration comes as several treasury firms shift focus toward capital-efficiency tools, including share buybacks, rather than large, recurring purchases.

Executives say those measures are designed to protect bitcoin-per-share metrics and counter declining market-to-NAV valuations that have weighed on stock prices this year.

In any case, the buildup in corporate holdings is adding to Bitcoin’s structural tightness and rangebound price action amid disillusioned short-term holders, analysts previously told Decrypt. 

Fidelity estimates that public companies now represent roughly 5% of the asset’s illiquid supply, a category expected to reach about 42% of circulating Bitcoin by 2032, the report cited.

With treasuries, long-term investors, and entities with low spending behavior making up the core of that cohort, the divergence between slower inflows and record holdings suggests the corporate Bitcoin sector is waiting for further signs of renewed investor appetites.