Bitmine's Relentless Ethereum Buying Is About to End, Tom Lee Says

Bitmine Immersion Technologies plans to stop buying Ethereum once its holdings reach 5% of the token's circulating supply, chairman Tom Lee announced at Token2049 in Singapore. The company — which trades on the NYSE — has been adding ETH to its treasury on a weekly basis since launching the strategy in June 2025. Lee said the firm is about 100,000 ETH short of the 5% "hard cap," and at the recent acquisition pace that gap should close in roughly six to seven weeks.

As of the company's latest disclosure, Bitmine holds 6,016,414 ETH, representing about 4.9% of supply. The firm added approximately $41 million worth of ETH in the week before Lee’s remarks. Bitmine has described the 5% threshold as a limit intended to optimize shareholder value and has previously indicated it might sell staking rewards to prevent its holding from exceeding that cap.

The approaching stop matters because Bitmine's regular purchases have been a steady source of demand through a volatile period for the crypto market. Analysts and market participants flagged that removing this persistent buyer could change the dynamics of Ethereum demand, since the company had provided predictable, repeated bids for ETH over more than a year.

Bitmine’s accumulation has not been without cost: tracking data cited by the company shows the treasury carries about $4.5 billion in unrealized losses, since much of the ETH was acquired during last year's higher market prices. Ethereum traded near $2,570 on the day of Lee’s comments and fell about 5.5% during Asian hours, a decline that coincided with the Token2049 remarks.

Lee framed the accomplishment as compressing a five-year plan into just over a year and called reaching the 5% cap a milestone. Once the firm stops its regular buying, the market will lose one of its most consistent buying programs, a change that could influence short-term demand patterns for ETH.