contemporary financial history, few companies have dared to completely redefine their purpose with as much radicalism as the one founded by Michael Saylor. In 1989, this visionary entrepreneur created MicroStrategy, an IT company specializing in business intelligence. For over three decades, the company led a traditional existence, thriving in the tech sector. Then came August 2020. On August 11, to be exact, Michael Saylor announced a stunning new strategic direction for his company : the “Bitcoin Strategy.”
In the aftermath, MicroStrategy acquired 21,454 bitcoins for a total of 250 million dollars. What then seemed like a treasury eccentricity would become the central pivot of an absolute metamorphosis, culminating in August 2025 with the company changing its name, simply rebranded as Strategy.
Yet, despite resounding stock market success and total transparency, a portion of the financial and media establishment continues to view this construct with suspicion. Worse still, some commentators do not hesitate to brand Strategy with the infamous label of a “Ponzi scheme.”
It is time to confront these accusations with the reality of facts, economics, and history. Words have meaning. Misusing them is not only inaccurate, but it does a profound disservice to those trying to understand a completely unprecedented financial phenomenon
The Numbers Before the Court of Public Opinion
To understand the scale of the misunderstanding, we must first look at the mathematical reality of the company’s performance. In August 2020, when the “Bitcoin Strategy” was initiated, the company’s stock was trading at around $13.5 (adjusted for successive splits). Today, in late March 2026, it trades at around $139.
This trajectory represents a staggering increase of +924% in five and a half years.
Simon Willison is a prolific independent software developer, a blogger, and one of the most visible and trusted voices on the impact AI is having on builders. He co-created Django, the web framework that powers Instagram, Pinterest, and tens of thousands of other websites.
He coined the term “prompt injection,” popularized the terms “AI slop” and “agentic engineering,” and has built over 100 open source projects, including Datasette, a data analysis tool used by investigative journalists worldwide.
What makes Simon unique is that he’s made the leap from traditional software engineering to AI-native development more fully and visibly than almost anyone—and he’s been documenting everything he learns in real time on his blog, SimonWillison.net.
According to Simon Willison November 2025 was the inflection point when AI coding agents crossed from “mostly works” to “actually works”
Simon writes 95% of his code from his phone now . And that is a very good example according to me. I am a Mechanical Engineer and my Dreams plus my aims have only one purpose : To do at least 90% of my engineering tasks on my phone. I am working toward that ultimate goal every day of my life.
