Strategy CEO Phong Le says the company plans to resume Bitcoin buying later in 2026 after a seven-week pause and $213M in recent BTC sales.
Strategy Plans to Resume Bitcoin Buying After Seven-Week Pause
$108.6 million worth of Bitcoin was sold by Strategy last week, but CEO Phong Le says the world’s largest corporate Bitcoin holder plans to return to buying the cryptocurrency later this year after a seven-week purchasing pause.
The announcement comes at an unusual moment for Strategy, formerly known as MicroStrategy. Instead of adding Bitcoin to its balance sheet as it has done for years, the company has recently been selling portions of its holdings while aggressively building its U.S. dollar reserves and buying back its preferred stock.
Le’s comments suggest the change is not an abandonment of Strategy’s Bitcoin strategy. Instead, the company is temporarily prioritizing liquidity and its capital structure before attempting to restart its accumulation machine.
Strategy is still positioning Bitcoin as its core treasury asset despite its recent selling activity.
How Strategy’s Bitcoin strategy changed
Strategy’s latest shift has unfolded over several weeks rather than in a single trading session.
The company went through a five-week period without buying Bitcoin by late July. During the week ending July 26, Strategy reported no Bitcoin purchases or sales and held approximately 843,775 BTC.
The situation changed in early August.
Between July 27 and August 2, Strategy sold 1,638 BTC for approximately $104.7 million, according to filings. It then followed that transaction with another sale of 1,690 BTC between August 3 and August 9, generating approximately $108.6 million.
That brought the company’s holdings down to 840,447 BTC.
The two sales together amounted to roughly 3,328 BTC and $213.3 million, marking a sharp departure from Strategy’s traditional pattern of regularly adding to its Bitcoin treasury.
The latest sale was also the company’s fourth Bitcoin sale since June, according to Fortune, extending a period in which Strategy has increasingly focused on strengthening its balance sheet.
Why Strategy stopped buying Bitcoin
The main catalyst is not a sudden rejection of Bitcoin.
Strategy has been trying to build a larger cash buffer while supporting its preferred-stock financing structure. The company raised about $653.1 million by selling MSTR common stock in the latest reporting period and put roughly $650 million into its U.S. dollar reserve. That lifted the reserve to approximately $4.65 billion as of August 9.
The company also used proceeds from its latest Bitcoin sale to repurchase 1,152,020 shares of STRC, Strategy’s Stretch preferred stock, for an average price of roughly $94.29 per share.
That matters because Strategy’s ability to raise capital efficiently depends heavily on investor confidence in its preferred securities.
The company has previously linked renewed Bitcoin purchases to STRC recovering toward its $100 par value. CoinDesk reported earlier this month that Strategy’s stated objective was for STRC to trade around $99 to $100 over time, while its dividend remained at 12% for August.
In other words, Strategy is trying to repair the financing mechanism that has historically helped fund its Bitcoin purchases.
Who is exposed to the shift?
Bitcoin holders are not the only investors watching the decision.
MSTR shareholders are directly exposed because Strategy’s stock has increasingly traded as a leveraged Bitcoin proxy. When the company accumulates BTC, investors gain exposure to a larger corporate Bitcoin treasury. When Strategy sells Bitcoin, the market can interpret that as a weakening of the accumulation strategy.
STRC holders are exposed from another direction. Strategy has been using capital to support the preferred stock while keeping its dividend at 12%. The recovery of STRC toward its $100 stated value could therefore become an important signal for the company’s next phase.
Bitcoin itself is also exposed to the narrative.
Strategy’s 840,447 BTC position makes it an exceptionally large corporate holder. However, the company’s recent sales are small compared with the total Bitcoin market. Le has previously argued that Strategy’s Bitcoin transactions do not have a meaningful effect on broader market trends.
The more important impact may therefore be sentiment rather than immediate supply pressure.
What Phong Le says about the next purchases
Le has been clear that Strategy’s Bitcoin strategy has not been abandoned.
Speaking to Fox Business, he said the company would “get back to buying more Bitcoin throughout the course of the year.”
The CEO has also emphasized the importance of liquidity after the company’s experience in 2026. Recent reporting indicates that Strategy’s dollar reserve has grown from roughly $800 million earlier in the year to around $4.65 billion.
Le’s comments are significant because Strategy’s historical model depended heavily on continuously accessing capital markets to acquire Bitcoin.
The current approach is more defensive: build dollars first, strengthen preferred-stock markets, then return to Bitcoin accumulation when doing so makes financial sense for shareholders.
Historical context: this is not Strategy’s first pause
Strategy’s Bitcoin buying pauses have happened before, but the current period is unusual because the company has moved beyond simply waiting to purchase BTC and has also become a seller.
The company sold Bitcoin in late 2022, but that transaction was much smaller and occurred in a completely different market environment. In 2026, Strategy has now conducted multiple sales while simultaneously raising capital and rebuilding its cash reserves.
At the beginning of May, Strategy reported 818,334 BTC, meaning its holdings had grown substantially during the first part of 2026.
By late May, holdings had reached 843,738 BTC, demonstrating how quickly the treasury had expanded before the later pause and sales.
The contrast is important: Strategy has not abandoned Bitcoin accumulation after years of buying. It has instead shifted from aggressive accumulation to capital preservation before potentially restarting the cycle.
What could trigger the next Bitcoin purchase?
The first major catalyst is STRC’s recovery toward $100.
Le previously tied new Bitcoin purchases to the preferred stock returning to par, meaning a sustained recovery in STRC could reopen one of Strategy’s preferred funding channels.
The second catalyst is the company’s $4.65 billion cash reserve. A stronger liquidity position gives Strategy more flexibility to meet preferred dividends and other obligations without immediately relying on Bitcoin sales.
The third is the broader Bitcoin market.
Strategy does not appear to have announced a specific BTC price at which it will resume buying. Instead, Le has framed future purchases around whether transactions create value for shareholders.
Regulatory developments could also matter. Le has pointed to expected U.S. crypto legislation, including the CLARITY Act, as an important potential catalyst for the industry, with a vote expected around September.
For now, Strategy has swapped its Bitcoin-buying machine for a cash-building operation—but Le says the orange dots are coming back.
