Japanese public company Metaplanet, often referred to as “Asia’s MicroStrategy,” raised a new round of Bitcoin (BTC) on Tuesday. The company purchased an additional 21.88 Bitcoins worth 200 million yen ($1.4 million) – an average price of 9.14 million yen ($57,600) per coin.
The recent acquisition provides a total of 225,611 Bitcoin reserves, which at press time amounts to $14.57 million. As of early Tuesday, the price of the leading cryptocurrency was $64,599.2. The additional purchases follow Metaplanet’s recent July 8 acquisition of 42,466 Bitcoin reserves. At the time, the purchase was worth 400 million yen ($2.5 million).
Metaplanet has been steadily buying Bitcoins since April, making BTC a strategic treasury reserve asset. The reason the company added bitcoin to its treasury is to diversify against the weak Japanese yen.
In particular, the yen has been affected by low interest rates in Japan. As a result, Metaplanet sees cryptocurrencies as an inflation hedge to be more resilient to economic problems.
“Metaplanet has radically adapted its treasury business to navigate Japan’s challenging economic landscape, while setting a local precedent for corporate innovation in asset management,” the company noted in May.
What’s more, Metaplanet gained the most from Japanese equities, surging 158% in May after adding Bitcoin to its portfolio.
Metaplanet follows MicroStrategy
Bitcoin accumulation in “Asia MicroStrategy” was similar to that of MicroStrategy, the largest corporate Bitcoin holder.
Metaplanet issued a statement on May 13 revealing its intention to use a range of capital market instruments. The company intended to increase its BTC reserves, mirroring MicroStrategy’s approach.
Metaplanet is currently listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, which limits access for US investors. However, according to Arnab Naskar, co-founder of security token platform STOKR, plans are underway to tokenize Metaplanet’s holdings in the Tier 2 Liquid Bitcoin network.
Several corporate Bitcoin holders have begun to reap the benefits, such as MicroStrategy. According to data aggregated by Saylortracker, Michael Saylor ‘s company now has a total valuation in excess of $14 billion.
