Michael Saylor declares Bitcoin's victory, but Strategy takes a pause: what lies behind the calm?
Michael Saylor, Chairman of the Board of Strategy, made a bold statement: Bitcoin has achieved its greatest victory. However, immediately afterward, his company took a five-week pause in BTC purchases. A paradox? Not at all. As I see it, this is a signal that the main risks for the leading cryptocurrency have now shifted from external factors to within the community itself.
While Saylor proclaims triumph, his analytical department, according to Arkham data, has focused on something else. Instead of replenishing cryptocurrency reserves, Strategy has built a substantial dollar reserve of $3.75 billion. This clearly shows the simultaneous implementation of two opposing strategies.
Why the Pause? BIP-110 as a Point of Tension
The timing of this lull is no coincidence. The community's attention has centered on proposal BIP-110 — a soft fork limiting the amount of arbitrary data in transactions. Developer Dayton Om has already included it in the Bitcoin Knots client. Miners began signaling support as early as December 1, 2025, but the majority ignored them. However, the process cannot be stopped.
According to the implementation schedule, the mandatory lock-in phase will begin around August 2026. From that point, blocks without a support signal will be considered invalid. The activation of BIP-110 will become guaranteed, and within two weeks, the rules will take effect. Saylor criticizes not the voting procedure itself, but the rigidly prescribed timeline that is about to be set in motion.
What's Wrong with BIP-110: An Expert's Opinion
Saylor compares Bitcoin's consensus rules to a constitution defining property, scarcity, and authority. According to him, any attempt to rewrite these rules to serve the interests of specific groups harms all network participants. He highlighted three key issues: the introduction of censorship for legitimate transactions, opening new attack vectors, and reducing blockspace scarcity, which leads to increased costs.
Saylor's main technical objection concerns miner revenue. Block subsidies are halved every 210,000 blocks, and an increasing portion of Bitcoin's security budget relies on transaction fees. Weakening the fee market, in his view, reduces the network's resilience. Proponents of the initiative counter that unsystematic data investments overload nodes and crowd out real payments.
Notably, Saylor is not alone in his criticism. Adam Back from Blockstream also opposes BIP-110, but his concern is less about censorship and more about the activation threshold being too low at 55%, which opens up risks of a hard fork.
Strategy: From Purchases to Cash Accumulation
Raising capital through equity proved more advantageous than deviating from the chosen financial plan. An 8-K report filed on July 27 confirms the dollar reserve was increased by $525 million. The total amount reached $3.75 billion — which, according to the company's estimate, is sufficient to pay dividends for 2.1 years, given annual obligations to preferred stock holders of approximately $1.76 billion.
Strategy raised this money through stock offerings, not by selling Bitcoin. The company recently sold MSTR shares worth $544.5 million, of which approximately $467 million and another $263.5 million came from issuance two weeks prior. Over three weeks, total stock sales amounted to about $1.26 billion. However, shares had to be issued cheaply: MSTR is currently trading at $96.66 — roughly 76% below its 52-week high of $414.36.
Where is the Limit? The 1 Million BTC Goal at Risk
Strategy announced its intention to accumulate 1 million BTC by the end of 2026. The company currently holds 843,775 BTC. It is short by 156,225 BTC. There are about 22 weeks left until the end of the year. To close the gap, it would need to buy approximately 7,000 BTC per week — about $447 million at the current price. Currently, the company is not buying Bitcoin at all.
The company's average purchase price for the cryptocurrency is $75,494 per coin. The Bitcoin price is around $63,817. From its peak value of $126,080 in October 2025, the price has deviated by nearly 49%. The current portfolio revaluation shows an unrealized loss of $9.9 billion.
My analysis shows that the situation with STRC preferred shares, trading around $88.86 (11% below their $100 par value), creates additional pressure. This pressure likely influenced the decision to launch the Digital Credit Capital Framework on June 29, which authorized share buybacks and Bitcoin sales of up to $1.25 billion.
Expert Commentary: We are witnessing a classic conflict between short-term financial discipline and long-term faith in an asset. Saylor, in essence, chose to protect the company's balance sheet in the face of internal threats to the protocol. While the community tries to safeguard Bitcoin's architecture, Strategy is hedging against potential turbulence. Investors should watch August closely — the opening of the signal window for BIP-110 could be a decisive moment for the entire market.