Strive, Inc. (Nasdaq: ASST) purchased an additional 1,110 bitcoins, raising its total holdings to 21,356 BTC. On the day the news broke, the company's stock rose by more than 11%.
What was bought, and for how much
According to an 8-K filing with the SEC—confirmed by CEO Matt Cole—the purchase took place between August 17 and August 21. The company spent approximately $81.5 million at an average price of $73,409 per bitcoin, inclusive of fees. Compared to the 20,246 BTC the company held in mid-August, this represents a roughly 5.5% increase in its holdings—one of the month's most substantial purchases, far outpacing the smaller acquisitions Strive had been making earlier in August.
Where this places Strive in the rankings
With 21,356 BTC, the company now holds the seventh spot among the world's largest corporate Bitcoin treasuries. It trails entities such as Michael Saylor’s Strategy (840,447 BTC), Twenty One Capital (43,514 BTC), Metaplanet (43,000 BTC), MARA (35,577 BTC), and the Bitcoin Standard Treasury Company (30,021 BTC), according to data from Bitcoin Treasuries.
A significant portion of these holdings did not come solely from open-market purchases: in January 2026, the acquisition of Semler Scientific added approximately 5,048 BTC to Strive’s balance sheet in a single move—a leap that helped position the company among the major publicly traded holders of bitcoin.
Why the stock reacted strongly
The surge of over 11% can be attributed to two combined factors. The first is the most obvious: the market has begun to view ASST as an indirect way to bet on Bitcoin’s appreciation. When the price of BTC rises, the value of the company's treasury increases proportionally, and this is usually reflected directly in the stock price.
The second factor concerns how Strive funds these purchases. The company raises capital primarily by selling its own shares on the market—both common shares (ASST) and preferred shares (SATA), the latter paying a variable dividend of 13%. In this latest round, the number of Class A common shares in circulation rose by approximately 3.65 million, reaching roughly 79.9 million, while SATA preferred shares increased by around 441,000 units. In a scenario where Bitcoin is rising, this strategy tends to work in the shareholder's favor: the purchased asset appreciates faster than the cost of diluting the shareholder base to fund it. The risk, of course, is the reverse—if Bitcoin falls, the dilution remains, but without the corresponding gain.
Context: why the company is accelerating now
Matt Cole has been publicly arguing that the next Bitcoin cycle could be the strongest ever seen—a point he reiterated recently when noting that the asset had set a record for the largest weekly dollar-value gain in history. According to him, being too conservative carries its own risk: waiting for the company's cash reserves to grow before buying Bitcoin could mean paying a higher price for fewer coins down the line. Cole acknowledges that a market correction could occur at any time but remains convinced that the previous bear market is already in the past.
Industry backdrop
Strive was founded in 2022 by Vivek Ramaswamy and Anson Frericks and became a publicly traded company focused on Bitcoin following a reverse merger with Asset Entities, completed in September 2025. Since then, it has followed the playbook popularized by Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy): using Bitcoin as a corporate reserve asset and turning to the capital markets—rather than debt—to fund new purchases. Other mid-sized companies have made the same bet: raising capital in the equity market while the cost of doing so remains lower than the rate of Bitcoin's appreciation. The math works out well in a bull market. If Bitcoin reverses course, however, the share dilution remains, without the corresponding gains to offset it.
This text is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. The figures cited reflect public data available as of August 24, 2026.
