Bitcoin has slid to within a few hundred dollars of what Strategy paid on average for its pile. If you own the stock or its preferred shares, the company's cushion for riding out another leg down is almost gone.

Bitcoin traded around $75,955 on November 7, according to CryptoTicker, after sitting at $75,000 on November 6, its lowest level since late August. Strategy's average cost is $75,451 per coin, based on its November 2 filing with the SEC, which put holdings at 849,327 BTC bought for a total of $64.08 billion. The gap between the two numbers works out to roughly $430 million of unrealized profit, on a position that was worth more than $2 billion above cost as recently as the start of the month.

That's about 0.7% of cushion on the largest corporate bitcoin treasury in the world, and about 40% below the $126,210 peak bitcoin hit last year. The data points in the brief that circulated this week are partly stale, so a correction is in order. Strategy's enterprise mNAV, the measure of how the market values the company against the bitcoin it owns, did drop below 1 in late June, as CoinDesk reported on June 27. It has since recovered. FinanceFeeds put it at about 1.10 to 1.11 around the weekend of November 1, and mNAV.com showed 1.14. The stock is not trading below the value of its coins right now. It is trading just above it.

The framework that lets Strategy sell bitcoin isn't a hypothetical either. CoinDesk reported on June 29 that the company authorised a Bitcoin Monetization Program of up to $1.25 billion, built a $2.55 billion USD reserve to cover dividends and interest, set $1 billion buyback programs for both its common stock and its preferred securities, and lifted the STRC dividend to 12% from 11.5%. The company said the program doesn't oblige it to sell anything. It has sold anyway.

Cointelegraph reported on August 3 that Strategy sold 1,638 bitcoin over the previous week at an average of $63,957, raising $104.7 million. Half went to STRC dividends and half to STRC buybacks, and it was the second-largest sale of the year. FinanceFeeds tallies 2026 sales at $431.8 million so far. Michael Saylor spent years telling people never to sell. His own company now sells a little most months to pay the people who hold its preferred paper.

Strategy's software arm brought in just $129.5 million in revenue while the company's 848,517 BTC produced the accounting windfall. Its stock premium over Bitcoin, the engine behind every past purchase, barely moved despite the quarter's gains. - strategy reports record 19 billion quarterly profit analysis - why bitcoin price drives strategy earnings per share

The week to November 1 shows how the machine is running. Strategy's November 2 filing disclosed that it sold 1,178,552 MSTR shares for $164.0 million net and spent $208.2 million buying back 2,092,035 STRC shares at $99.52. It also bought 811 bitcoin for $65.5 million at $80,846 each. Those coins are already about $5,000 under water apiece, a paper loss near $2 million, which is small, but it's the newest purchase and it's the one the market will check first.

What a seller at this size does to the price

Look at what the buyback is really for. STRC trades near its $100 par value, and the company is defending that price with cash raised by selling common stock and, when needed, bitcoin. FinanceFeeds noted that the preferred buybacks outran new capital raised that week by about $109.7 million. That works while the common stock holds a premium. If mNAV slips back under 1, issuing new shares to fund anything stops making sense, and bitcoin becomes the only source of dollars.

The sums involved are small next to the pile. Selling the full $1.25 billion authorised would be about 1.6% of the holdings at today's price. But the buyer of last resort is the one that's selling, and every sale below the average cost locks in a realised loss on those coins, as the August sale at $63,957 did. Frankly, that's what the market is pricing when the stock drops. MSTR closed at $129.30 on November 6, down from $141.09 two days earlier, per FinanceFeeds.

Critics aren't being subtle. Peter Schiff, the gold bug who has attacked the strategy for years, used the drop to point out that six years of buying haven't delivered the roughly 30% annual return Saylor once projected, according to Brave New Coin. Schiff always says this, and it's still a fair question to ask of a company whose pitch was that bitcoin beats everything else you could hold.

Analysts at CryptoTicker see a zone between $73,000 and $76,000 as likely to hold, since short-term holders' average cost sits there too, and flag a close below $73,000 as the sign of a longer slide with support nearer $60,000. Strategy's next weekly 8-K is due Monday, November 9, covering election week. It will show whether the company bought, sold, or did nothing.

Also read: Binance tells French users it will close their accounts on December 31 • Suspicious Kalshi and Polymarket bets landed hours before Times/Siena polls • Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs End Six Days of Outflows With $252.5M Haul

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