Public companies including MARA, Riot, Cango, and Bitdeer have sold billions in Bitcoin in 2026, mostly to repay convertible debt or fund pivots into AI infrastructure.

Strategy absorbed more supply than every other company sold combined, adding 90,831 BTC across 13 consecutive weeks while holding 766,970 BTC total.

If the macro conditions improves and institutional buying picks back up, Bitcoin could push toward $80,000 to $100,000 by the second half of 2026, but a break below $65,000 would open the door to $55,000-$60,000.

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Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) has always been touted as a digital gold you buy and hold—and will go up if you're patient enough. That narrative convinced public companies to load their balance sheets with BTC through 2024 and 2025, raising billions and telling shareholders Bitcoin was the smartest place to put corporate cash.

Now that the Bitcoin price has dropped 47% from its October 2025 high, those same companies are selling off their holdings. MARA dumped 15,133 BTC to retire $1 billion in debt, Bitdeer sold its entire treasury down to zero, while Bitfarms told investors it's no longer a Bitcoin company. Genius Group also liquidated its last 84 BTC to repay a court-ordered debt, and Strategy, which is the biggest BTC believer, has paused its buying.

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The Bitcoin price is still around $69,000 despite all of it, but the current macro headwinds point to more downturn. So, is Bitcoin still a digital gold to hold as companies sell off their bags?

The Bitcoin holdings selling is spread across companies in different sectors, including miners, treasury firms, and even a sovereign government. Here are the biggest BTC sales by companies so far in 2026:

Company

BTC Sold

Proceeds

Reason

BTC Remaining

MARA Holdings

15,133

$1.1B

Retire $1B in convertible notes at 9% discount

38,689

Riot Platforms

3,778

$289.5M

Liquidity needs and AI pivot

15,680

Cango (now EcoHash)

4,451

$305M

Repay BTC-collateralized loan and fund AI pivot

3,645

Bitdeer

2,000

Undisclosed

Full liquidation to fund AI/HPC shift

0

Bitfarms (now Keel Infrastructure)

Ongoing

$28.2M

Selling all remaining BTC, exiting mining entirely

1,827

Genius Group

84

$5.6M

Court-ordered debt repayment

0

Empery Digital

370

$24.7M

Repay term loan

2,989

Bhutan (sovereign)

3,103

Undisclosed

Systematic reduction of sovereign holdings

Reduced

Most of these companies raised billions through zero-coupon convertible notes in 2024 and 2025 specifically to buy Bitcoin. With the Bitcoin price dropping 47% from its all-time high, those notes didn't shrink with the price, so the companies are liquidating the BTC they bought to repay the debt they used to buy it. Some did it strategically, while others had no choice. Genius Group was forced to sell by a court order that blocked it from raising capital any other way.

Bitcoin mining firms are selling as it now costs up to $80,000 to mine one Bitcoin. Bitfarms declared that it is no longer a Bitcoin company and is rebranding as Keel Infrastructure to build AI data centres. Cango rebranded as EcoHash and is deploying GPU units across over 40 sites. CoreWeave's $9 billion acquisition of Core Scientific proved the market values miner infrastructure more for AI than for Bitcoin, and the rest of the industry is following.

You'd expect the roughly $2 billion in corporate Bitcoin selling in Q1 to have pushed the BTC price off a cliff, but Bitcoin has held above $66,000 through all of it. The reason is that the selling has been matched almost dollar for dollar by consistent buying. Public companies still hold roughly 1.16 million BTC, which is more than 5% of Bitcoin's total fixed supply.

Strategy (NASDAQ:MSTR) alone added 90,831 BTC across 13 consecutive weeks from late December through March, absorbing more supply than what other companies sold combined. At 766,970 BTC, Strategy holds more than every other public company put together, and its average cost of $75,694 means Saylor is underwater right now but hasn't sold a single coin despite that. Strategy’s buying is essentially why the selling hasn’t affected the Bitcoin price much.

Bitcoin ETFs have also helped stabilize the price. In March, Bitcoin ETF products posted $1.32 billion in net inflows, which was the first positive month after four consecutive months of outflows. Cumulative BTC ETF inflows since launch are above $56 billion with $90.3 billion in total assets. While miners and overleveraged treasury firms dumped BTC to pay off debt, Strategy and ETFs have been absorbing the supply before it can weigh on the Bitcoin price.

Most of the forced corporate selling is either done or winding down, and Bitcoin held above $66,000 through all of it. Where the BTC price goes from here depends on how well macro conditions improve.

If the Iran war winds down and oil prices drop enough to bring rate cut expectations back, Bitcoin could break above the $75,000 resistance. Post-halving supply is tight at just 450 BTC mined per day, so it wouldn't take a massive surge in buying to push the Bitcoin price into the $80,000 to $100,000 range by the second half of the year. The CLARITY Act passing in late April would likely accelerate the move, as it is a key catalyst the broader market is waiting on.

If the war continues without major escalation and oil prices hover around current levels, Bitcoin would probably keep grinding between $68,000 and $75,000 for most of Q2. ETF inflows have already started turning positive again after four straight months of outflows, and Strategy is likely to resume buying once it secures fresh capital. That's enough to hold the $66,000 support, but without a genuine shift in the macro conditions, BTC would need a catalyst it doesn't currently have to break out convincingly above $75,000.

A further escalation in the war could crack the $66,000 support. Mining already costs up to $80,000 per BTC, so a drop into the $55,000 to $60,000 range would push more miners into forced selling just to cover operational costs. And that’s the same cycle that's been driving the corporate dumping all year. Such a scenario would likely mark a capitulation bottom, which would see Bitcoin drop below $60,000.

The companies that bought Bitcoin with borrowed money are paying the price for it now, but the selling hasn't broken the market. Strategy and the ETFs have absorbed the selling pressure, and the BTC price is still above $66,000 after more than $2 billion in corporate sales in Q1.

Where Bitcoin goes from here is less about the companies selling and more about whether the macro conditions that forced them to sell start to change. Our conservative prediction has BTC grinding between $68,000 and $75,000 through Q2, but if the war ends and the CLARITY Act passes, the path to $80,000 would open up again.

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