While most traders recovered from last week’s sell-off, BitMine Immersion Technologies (BMNR) quietly bought the dip, purchasing another 21,537 Ethereum tokens. This brings the company’s total holdings to over 3.55 million ETH, about 3% of circulating supply, valued at more than $10 billion.
Tom Lee’s publicly traded firm is now second only to the Ethereum Foundation among known holders, and it still has capital available to continue buying.
From Bitcoin Miner to Ethereum Whale in Twelve Months
BitMine began as a small-cap immersion-cooling operation focused on Bitcoin mining. A year ago, it held zero ETH. Then Chairman Tom Lee, the Fundstrat co-founder known for calling Bitcoin at $45,000, decided Ethereum offered a superior economic profile.
Staking returns, tokenization trends, and a supply structure that contracts over time prompted him to shift the entire corporate treasury.
To execute the pivot, the company raised funds through multiple equity offerings totaling more than $2 billion this year and converted nearly all proceeds into ETH as prices fell. This produced an average cost of about $4,009 per coin, and with current prices roughly 28% lower, paper losses exceed $4 billion, yet the buying never stopped
How One Company Now Holds an Entire Nation-State’s Worth of Ethereum
Lookonchain highlighted the newest purchases made over the weekend and into Monday morning: 21,537 ETH on Sunday and another 28,625 ETH from FalconX, contributing to a broader accumulation that added more than 186,000 coins in November. The company spent over $140 million in two days to expand its Ethereum holdings, and its holdings chart continues to rise even as the price chart trends in the opposite direction.
Lee describes this approach as “the alchemy of 5%,” noting that BitMine aims to acquire an additional 2.5 million ETH to reach roughly 6 million in total, a goal that remains mathematically achievable before the summer of 2026 at the current pace and pricing.
Three percent may not sound large until you compare it to daily spot volume on major exchanges, which rarely exceeds 0.5% of supply. A determined buyer accumulating coins faster than long-term holders release them places a firm floor under price even in a downturn.
What Holding 3% of Ethereum Means for the Market
As exchange reserves continue to fall, staking deposits continue to rise, and one NYSE-listed company with a $9 billion market cap has effectively removed $10 billion in potential sell pressure, unless its leadership chooses to reverse course.
Spot ETH ETFs saw $729 million in outflows over the past month, while BitMine added nearly half that amount during the same window.
BitMine still trades at a 10 – 15% discount to its Ethereum net asset value, pays a modest dividend, and plans to launch a US-only validator network next year that could distribute ETH rewards directly to shareholders. For now, each decline invites the same response: another transfer to the prime broker and another quiet increase in the company’s growing holdings.
