Ethereum treasury firm closes in on accumulation target
Bitmine announced Monday that its Ether holdings had reached 5.78 million tokens, representing approximately 4.8% of Ethereum’s circulating supply. The company acquired 7,430 ETH over the past week, moving closer to its stated goal of accumulating 5% of all ETH in existence.
The treasury expansion reflects Bitmine’s strategy of combining direct holdings with institutional staking. About 4.9 million ETH, or roughly 85% of Bitmine’s treasury, is currently staked through its validator network and partners. During the three-month period ended May 31, Bitmine’s staking platform MAVAN generated $45.7 million in staking and validation revenue, accounting for 98% of the company’s total revenue.
Bitmine also repurchased 5.5 million shares during the week under its previously authorized $4 billion buyback program, signaling continued capital deployment alongside ETH accumulation.
Layer-2 growth and institutional adoption
The Bitmine announcement coincides with broader institutional interest in Ethereum scaling networks. Robinhood launched Robinhood Chain, an Ethereum layer-2 network built on Arbitrum for tokenized stocks, earlier this month. During the blockchain’s first two weeks, it attracted more than $141 million in bridged Ether.
Bernstein analysts raised their price target on Robinhood to $160 per share from $130, citing tokenized equities and prediction markets as drivers of future growth. The firm highlighted Robinhood Chain as proprietary infrastructure for tokenized real-world assets.
ETH has gained 6.7% over the past seven days and 10% over the past month. The token traded at $1,582 on July 1, when Robinhood Chain launched, and reached $1,900 at the time of the Bitmine announcement, representing a 20% increase over the period.
Competing views on layer-2 value
Industry analysts offer divergent assessments of what layer-2 growth means for Ethereum’s long-term value. Lorenzo Valente of ARK Invest argues that Robinhood Chain supports the bullish case for ETH as the ecosystem’s monetary asset but weakens the thesis that Ethereum derives significant value from layer-2 fee revenue.
Max Shannon, senior research analyst at Bitwise, noted that “growth of the Ethereum ecosystem” remains important, but cautioned that whether institutional growth on Ethereum’s scaling networks ultimately strengthens ETH remains an open question.
Strategy, the world’s largest corporate Bitcoin holder, paused Bitcoin purchases for a second straight week and raised capital through stock sales. The company maintains a $3.2 billion cash reserve and holds 207 Bitcoin alongside its other assets.
