BitMine's ether holdings top 6 million tokens, near 5% of supply

BitMine Immersion Technologies said on 28 September 2026 that it now holds 6,001,302 ether, worth about $16.2 billion, after adding 17,362 ETH the week before. The buy lifts the company to 4.9% of all ether in circulation.

Those figures come from a company press release, and the trade outlet The Block reported the same totals. BitMine measured them as of 3:00 p.m. Eastern on 27 September. The company puts out an update most weeks. This one crossed 6 million for the first time.

Why BitMine is chasing 5% of all ether

BitMine wants to own 5% of every ether that exists. It calls the target the 'Alchemy of 5%'. At 4.9%, it is nearly there. Just shy of the target. Chairman Tom Lee said the milestone was "a tremendous achievement, accumulating this total in under 15 months." The company began buying ether in mid-2025 and has added to the pile in most weeks since.

Owning 5% of a major coin is rare for a public company. It would hand one firm a claim on one in every 20 ether in existence, at a time when supply sits near 122.1 million coins. No other listed company holds ether on this scale.

Where the $17.2 billion sits

The 6,001,302 ether makes up most of the total. BitMine valued the stash at about $16.2 billion, using an ether price of $2,698 from Coinbase. The rest of the $17.2 billion is a mix. It holds 213 bitcoin, $672 million in cash and marketable securities, a $180 million stake in Beast Industries, and $115 million in Eightco Holdings.

Most of that ether is put to work. BitMine said 5,067,309 ether, worth $13.7 billion, was staked and earning a 2.62% annual yield. Staking is the engine. The company expects about $358 million a year from it at current rates.

Shares in BitMine trade on the New York Stock Exchange as BMNR, and the company joined the Russell 1000 index in June. They changed hands at an average of about $1.1 billion a day over the five days to 25 September, by BitMine's own count. Tom Lee, the chairman, is a familiar market voice from his research firm Fundstrat.

The risks behind the milestone

A treasury built on one coin rises and falls with that coin. Ether traded near $2,724 at 12:36 UTC on 30 September 2026, according to CoinGecko, above the price BitMine used three days earlier. It can drop just as fast. The risk cuts both ways.

BitMine's totals are self-reported and not audited accounts. The release gave no net asset value and no ether-per-share figure, so it is hard to say what each share actually owns. BitMine is not the only firm doing this. Strategy, the largest corporate bitcoin holder, runs the same idea with bitcoin, and its stock has swung well beyond the coin it tracks. Firms that hold crypto often trade above or below the value of what they own, and that gap can close in either direction.

What to watch

Two markers are worth watching from here. The first is whether BitMine reaches a clean 5%. By its own count it sits at 98%. The second is the staking yield, because that is what turns a large stack of ether into real income. Ether's price sits behind both. Numbers change fast.