Video game retailer turned meme stock GameStop has announced that it has purchased Bitcoin, currently worth approximately $512 million.
The firm tweeted that it had purchased 4,710 BTC, after having completed a $1.5 billion offering of convertible senior notes to investors in early April.
At the time, GameStop stated that it planned to use the proceeds to establish a corporate Bitcoin treasury; while not explicitly stated in the Wednesday release, it is likely the $512.79 million Bitcoin acquisition is for this planned reserve.
GameStop did not immediately reply to Decrypt’s request for comment.
In March, GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen hinted at the retailer’s Bitcoin plans as he posed next to Strategy co-founder and Executive Chairman Michael Saylor, who established the business model of public companies holding Bitcoin as an asset.
As a result of Strategy’s embrace of Bitcoin, it transformed from a middling business intelligence software company to a firm with a market capitalization of $101.76 billion, according to TradingView. It appears that GameStop is looking to adopt a similar strategy, hoping for comparable success.
Firms follow Strategy’s Bitcoin playbook
GameStop isn’t the first public company to follow in Strategy’s footsteps. Crypto mining firms Marathon Digital Holdings Inc., Riot Platforms Inc., and CleanSpark all hold billions of dollars worth of Bitcoin each, while Elon Musk’s Tesla also holds $1.25 billion of Bitcoin as of December 2024.
And firms are branching out beyond Bitcoin for their corporate treasuries, too. On Tuesday, SharpLink Gaming, an online gambling marketer, raised $425 million to buy Ethereum for its treasury, with Consensys CEO and Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin joining the company’s board of directors.
What is GameStop?
Video game retailer GameStop found itself at the heart of a stock market phenomenon in 2021, when Redditors who believed its stock was undervalued fought in the markets against hedge fund short sellers. Keith Gill, aka Roaring Kitty, shot to fame as the leader of this movement, after taking to social media to protest the short sellers.
As a result, GME’s stock price skyrocketed due to a massive short squeeze sparked by the online buzz.
Since then, GameStop has traded as a “meme stock,” with its price fluctuations tied to social media hype. When Roaring Kitty posted a vague meme to social media after years of silence, GME more than doubled in price from market close on Friday to the Monday open—a massive surge in demand that prompted Nasdaq to halt trading nine times in one morning.
Daily Debrief Newsletter
Start every day with the top news stories right now, plus original features, a podcast, videos and more.
