Strive recently became a listed company through its reverse merger with Nasdaq-listed Asset Entities.
Strive, Inc. shares rose 3.5% in after-market trading on Tuesday, a modest surge following a nearly 50% decline over the last three sessions, marked by a slew of corporate announcements and its effective conversion into a Bitcoin holding company, with retail interest climbing significantly.
Nasdaq-listed Asset Entities, a marketing company, closed its merger with asset management company Strive on Friday, retaining Strive as the name of the resultant company and ticker ‘ASST.’
As part of the deal, first announced in May, Strive is also raising $750 million by selling stock, with an option of receiving another $750 million when investors exercise the warrants it had issued.
The more significant corporate update came on Monday, when it announced plans to become a Bitcoin holding and marketing company.
The company stated that it acquired 69 bitcoins via a Section 351 exchange (a form of tax-free asset transfer by founders and investors) as part of the merger with Asset Entities.
It also plans to use up to $1.5 billion from the ongoing stock sale and another $450 million from a new at-the-market (ATM) program sale to buy Bitcoins. Strive also announced a new board, which includes members with significant exposure to the cryptocurrency space.
“Strive is the first publicly traded asset management Bitcoin treasury company. The Company is focused on increasing Bitcoin per share to outperform Bitcoin over the long run,” the company’s description read in one of its statements.
Strive’s strategy echoes that of Michael Saylor’s Strategy, which shifted part of its corporate treasury into Bitcoin, and GameStop’s pivot toward cryptocurrency amid the Trump administration’s favorable policy environment.
A company with sizable Bitcoin holdings stands to see its asset base swell, and potentially its stock, when the cryptocurrency’s price climbs. The flip side is that the exposure also carries significant risk.
On Stocktwits, the retail sentiment was ‘extremely bullish,’ unchanged over the last seven days. Retail watchers of the stock have grown 37% over this period, and over 100% in the past three months, according to Stocktwits data.
User comments were mixed, expressing confusion as well as optimism on the company’s moves.
“$ASST as we near 11 thousand watchers i feel this needs to be said, this company has value here. It will not go bankrupt. They have a business plan with very wealthy connected people at the head of it,” said one user.
ASST stock is up a whopping 812% year-to-date.
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