Metaplanet Sets Aside 15% of Bitcoin Reserve for Acquisitions
The Japanese Bitcoin treasury wants to use its 44,000 BTC to help fund acquisitions and investments too, with Super League as the first test. The company keeps 85% to 90% of its assets in Bitcoin.
Key Takeaways
- Metaplanet can now hold up to 15% of its assets outside Bitcoin for acquisitions and investments.
- The company keeps about 85% to 90% of its assets in Bitcoin and wants to use extra returns to buy more BTC.
- Metaplanet combines its Bitcoin treasury with loans, bonds, and preferred shares, while borrowing against Bitcoin must stay below 10%.
Metaplanet has changed its own rules and can now hold up to 15% of its assets outside Bitcoin. The Japanese company owns 44,000 Bitcoin, but its market value is still below the value of those coins. With the new setup, Metaplanet wants to make room not just for Bitcoin, but also for acquisitions, investment income, and a new investment arm.
New Room Beside Bitcoin
Since April 2024, Metaplanet has raised money from investors to put into Bitcoin. The company will mostly keep doing that, because about 85% to 90% of its assets are supposed to stay in Bitcoin. The rest can now go into other areas, including acquisitions and income-producing investment instruments.
CEO Simon Gerovich said that Bitcoin was never the only goal from the start. The new rules also include a Net Interest Income Strategy, where Metaplanet raises money and puts it into assets that earn more than the financing costs. The profits from that are then supposed to be used to buy extra Bitcoin again, although the company says results are not guaranteed.
Super League as the First Step
The new direction lines up with an earlier deal from August, when Metaplanet agreed to transfer 2,100 BTC and $2.5 million (€2.2 million) to Super League Enterprise, a Nasdaq-listed media company. After approvals, the Japanese company expects to gain control there and change the name to Superplanet. That shows Metaplanet sees its Bitcoin position not just as a reserve, but also as a tool to buy into other companies.
At the same time, the company is keeping financing cautious. In many cases, it cannot sell new shares as long as Metaplanet is worth less than its Bitcoin holdings. According to BitcoinTreasuries, the market valued the company on Monday at 74 cents per dollar of Bitcoin. With Bitcoin trading at about $86,070 (€76,700), the coins were worth around $3.8 billion (€3.4 billion) in total, while the equity value was around $2.1 billion (€1.9 billion).
Careful With Borrowing
For European crypto followers, the most interesting part is that Metaplanet is increasingly combining its Bitcoin treasury with traditional corporate financing. The company wants to apply for a credit rating and is now relying on loans, bonds, and preferred shares for growth. It is also setting a limit on borrowing against its Bitcoin: that has to stay below about 10% of the value of the coins.
In the third quarter, Metaplanet sold more Bitcoin than it had debt and kept the cash on hand. After that, the company bought back more than it sold, for a net increase of 1,000 BTC. Gerovich said rating agencies and credit investors mainly want to know whether Bitcoin can really be turned into cash to pay obligations, and that Metaplanet answered that by doing exactly that. That fits the broader trend among publicly traded treasury companies, which are increasingly combining their balance sheets with financing and liquidity management; many of those stocks still trade below the value of their crypto.
