The bitcoin treasury boom is unwinding as some companies and governments sell holdings

Markets Share Share this article Copy link X icon X (Twitter) LinkedIn Facebook Email The bitcoin treasury boom is unwinding as some companies and governments sell holdings Falling prices and prolonged consolidation are pushing public firms and sovereign holders to liquidate bitcoin reserves to shore up balance sheets. By James Van Straten | Edited by Omkar Godbole Apr 2, 2026, 9:46 a.m. Make preferred on What to know : Public companies including Empery Digital, Genius Group and Riot Platforms have all sold bitcoin this week, citing debt repayment, liquidity needs, or strategic pivots into AI and HPC. Sovereign selling is also accelerating, with Bhutan offloading more bitcoin. Those who rushed into bitcoin BTC $ 66,402.60 over the past two years are now heading for the exits and it’s not a great sign for the market. Public companies, once seen as long-term holders, are increasingly selling bitcoin as prolonged price weakness weighs on balance sheets and strategic plans. Take Empery Digital (EMPD), which announced on Wednesday that it sold 370 BTC at an average price of $66,632, generating $24.7 million, leaving the company with 2,989 BTC. The firm used part of the proceeds to repay its outstanding term loan fully and also released approximately 1,800 BTC that had previously been held as collateral. Empery Digital began building its bitcoin treasury in July 2025 and accumulated a peak position of roughly 4,000 BTC. The firm's shares are down 75% from its 2025 all time high of $15.80. Genius Group (GNS), an AI-powered, bitcoin-focused education company that held up to 440 BTC in March last year, has completely sold off its stash. Recently, it liquidated its last remaining 84 BTC to repay $8.5 million in debt. The company stated it will resume building its bitcoin treasury when it believes market conditions are more favorable. This trend is not restricted to just mid-sized players. Riot Platforms (RIOT), one of the largest publicly traded bitcoin mining companies in the U.S., has also reportedly been selling, according to blockchain data tracked by Lookonchain . The company supposedly moved 500 BTC for roughly $34.13 million on Wednesday as it continues to tap its bitcoin treasury to fund its pivot into AI and high-performance computing, a strategy increasingly seen across the mining industry. Riot sold approximately $200 million worth of bitcoin in the final two months of 2025. Riot Platforms has accumulated bitcoin continuously through its mining operations, rather than adopting a single start date for a treasury strategy, and reached peak holdings of over 19,000 BTC. The company now holds roughly 17,500 BTC. Meanwhile, the Bhutan government continues to reduce its bitcoin holdings, having sold a total of 3,103 BTC. A single transaction on March 30 alone is said to have liquidated 375 BTC, further trimming its position, according to Glassnode data . Bhutan’s government built its bitcoin holdings over several years through state-backed mining operations, reaching a peak of over 13,000 BTC in October 2024. While the recent trend of liquidations is certainly disappointing for bulls, all is not lost yet. Public bitcoin treasury companies still hold around 1,164,800 BTC, according to BitcoinTreasuries.net . That's over 5% of the total BTC supply of 21 million. As of writing, bitcoin changed hands at $66,500, down over 2% since midnight UTC, according to CoinDesk data. Read More : MARA Holdings higher by 10% after selling $1.1 billion in bitcoin to fund debt buyback Bitcoin News More For You Encryption Supremacy: Zcash and Privacy in the Age of Scale By CoinDesk Research Mar 31, 2026 Commissioned by GenZcash Most crypto privacy models weaken as blockchain data grows. Encryption-based models like Zcash strengthen. CoinDesk Research maps the five privacy approaches and examines the widening gap. 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