BitMine bought 12,532 ether in the week ending October 11, its third straight week of shrinking purchases as the company winds down a 15-month accumulation campaign. The haul was down from 15,112 ETH the week before and 17,362 ETH the week prior, and it marks the smallest weekly buy since the treasury strategy began on June 30, 2025.
Chairman Tom Lee said during an interview with Yahoo Finance that BitMine has "basically" finished buying ether and is "done stacking," though it still needs roughly 100,000 more ETH to reach its goal of holding 5% of the asset's supply by late 2026.
Where the treasury stands
BitMine now holds 6,028,946 ETH, or about 4.9% of the 122.1 million ether in circulation, valued at $2,544 per token using Coinbase prices. Total crypto, cash and equity stakes come to $16.2 billion.
The company has staked 5,067,309 ETH, or 84% of its ether holdings. Lee projects $336 million in annual revenue from staked ether at a 2.61% seven-day yield, a figure that rises to $400 million once every token is staked.
Cash and marketable securities slipped to $612 million from $643 million a week earlier. BitMine didn't say why.
A shrinking cash cushion
The $31 million dip is small relative to a $16.2 billion balance sheet, but it's the kind of detail that draws attention when a company's entire thesis rests on converting liquid capital into a single volatile asset. BitMine has bought ether every week since launching its treasury strategy in mid-2025, funding much of it through equity and preferred stock sales rather than operating cash flow.
In June, the company sold 3.5 million shares of a 9.5% perpetual preferred stock, BMNP, at $80 each. Those shares last closed at $99.53, putting the current yield at 9.56%. BitMine also repurchased 21 million common shares for $350 million between July 14 and August 17. No buybacks have been reported since.
Built through a bear market
BitMine assembled its position over 15 months, most of it during a prolonged downturn in ether prices. The company's average entry isn't public, but the scale of the holdings makes it one of the largest corporate ether treasuries in existence. Lee's public framing has been consistent: buy steadily, stake aggressively, and treat the position as a long-duration bet on Ethereum's role in tokenized finance.
The slowdown in weekly purchases doesn't mean BitMine is selling. It means the company is close to the end of its accumulation phase and shifting toward yield generation. Staking already covers 84% of holdings; the remaining 16% is the runway for Lee's $400 million revenue target.
What to watch
Two numbers matter from here: the pace of staking the final 16% of the ether stack, and whether BitMine resumes share repurchases now that buying has tapered. The company needs about 100,000 more ETH to hit its 5% supply goal by late 2026 — a small amount relative to the 6 million it already holds, but enough to keep weekly purchase disclosures worth reading.
