STRC is at $95.20 right now. That matters, and here’s why.
This is the security Saylor sells as stable, trades near $100. But it doesn’t sit near $100 by magic. $95.20 is right down in the zone where, by their own framework, management says they’d recommend cranking the dividend back up to drag the price toward par again.
So let’s talk about that mechanism, because anyone holding this stuff really needs to understand it. It’s called “the ratchet.”
When STRC slips below par, the only real lever they’ve got is the dividend. Fatten the yield, pull buyers back in, nudge the price back toward $100. Sounds clever. Here’s the problem. Every crank is basically permanent. You can’t quietly un-raise a dividend, because the price will drop, and you’re back at square one. So the annual cash bill just keeps climbing. And it’s already been hiked seven times since launch. 9% all the way to 11.5%.
Now ask where the cash for that growing bill comes from. They don’t make money from operations. So it comes from one of two places: issuing more stock, or selling Bitcoin.
See the trap? Price falls, they hike the dividend to defend par, the bill grows, bigger bill means more pressure to issue or sell. In a real downturn that’s not a flywheel. It’s a whirlpool.
And now watch the words, because this is where it gets Orwellian. Saylor used to say “I’ll never sell Bitcoin.” Full stop. Now it’s “I’ll never be a net seller.” Spot the move?
Net seller means he can absolutely sell. He just has to buy more than he sells, BUT AND HERE IS THE IMPORTANT BIT, Oney whatever period he decides to measure, which could be over the last 5 years, or the next twenty.
So the promise already got quietly reworded once to fit what they’re actually doing. The question is simple: does he hold even this watered-down version? Or do we get the next rewrite, where “net seller” becomes some fresh phrase that conveniently fits whatever the structure forces on them that month? We’ve seen this film before. The words keep changing to match the situation.
And here’s the kicker. Even the dividend hike isn’t a promise. It’s a “framework” where management says they’ll recommend a raise, subject to the board, and they can suspend or change it whenever they want. Saylor said it himself about the $100 peg: no legal obligation under the security, it’s just the company’s “number one business objective.” An objective. Not a guarantee.
Look, if you’re going to put money you worked hard for into these perpetual preferreds, at least understand what you’re actually holding. I wrote a full 78-page report breaking down the real risks of these things in proper detail. It’s linked in the first comment below. Read it before you buy, not after. Read the full length report. These are your savings, money you worked hard for.
Breaking: Strategy Sells Bitcoin for First Time Since 2022 Tax-Loss Trade
According to an 8-K filing with the SEC, Strategy sold 32 BTC between May 26 and May 31 for approximately $2.5 million, marking its first Bitcoin sale since it sold 704 BTC in December 2022 for tax-loss harvesting before repurchasing more bitcoin two days later. The company said the latest sale proceeds are expected to fund preferred stock dividends.
As of May 31, Strategy held 843,706 BTC acquired at a total cost of $63.87 billion, with an average purchase price of $75,699 per bitcoin.