Bitcoin Premium Bubble Has Burst — NYDIG Says The Signal Is Clear
NYDIG’s newest weekly digest, printed September 5, 2025 and authored by Global Head of Research Greg Cipolaro, argues that the premium buyers as soon as paid for “Digital Asset Treasury” (DAT) firms has been deflating at the same time as bitcoin printed a contemporary all-time high in mid-August.
DATs are public firms whose core technique is to carry bitcoin on the stability sheet; the premium (or low cost) displays the hole between a agency’s share worth and its underlying internet asset worth (NAV) per bitcoin share. NYDIG’s takeaway: the once-frothy premium has compressed throughout the group, and that compression itself is rising as a macro-signal for Bitcoin’s cycle slightly than a company-specific quirk.
Bitcoin Treasury Companies Feel The Heat
Cipolaro points to a confluence of drivers behind the premium squeeze: investor nervousness forward of huge provide unlocks; altering enterprise targets amongst DAT administration groups; tangible will increase in share issuance; profit-taking after sturdy runs; and restricted differentiation throughout company treasury methods. The dynamic is seen even on the largest bellwethers, the place “premiums on Digital Asset Treasury firms … proceed to compress,” regardless of bitcoin’s August report. NYDIG frames this as a structural reset slightly than a blip of sentiment.
The provide calendar is entrance and heart. NYDIG cautions that “for a lot of DATs, circumstances could deteriorate earlier than they enhance,” as a result of quite a few BTC-focused treasuries nonetheless want to finish mergers or finalize fairness and debt financings to register shares for unrestricted buying and selling. In many circumstances, “over 95% of the brand new excellent shares are tied to those transactions,” implying a possible wave of secondary provide as soon as registrations go efficient. If costs into these unlocks weaken, the promoting stress may feed on itself.
Price references from latest fundraises underscore the chance. NYDIG notes that Twenty One’s inventory is buying and selling beneath its June $21 PIPE (although above an April $10 PIPE), whereas Nakamoto trades beneath a $5 extra PIPE (however above its $1.12 PIPE). ProCap/Columbus Capital sits simply above its SPAC and most well-liked fairness increase worth, and Bitcoin Standard Treasury Co./Cantor Equity Partners is simply marginally above its PIPE stage. Slipping beneath these anchor costs wouldn’t solely stress current buyers however may additionally amplify post-registration promoting by new holders who’re close to or underneath water.
If premiums preserve compressing and reductions open up, probably the most direct treatment NYDIG highlights is company buybacks. Yet, amongst main bitcoin-treasury names, buyback authorizations are largely absent. Empery Digital is the exception, buying and selling at a roughly 24% low cost to NAV with a program in place. By distinction, Nakamoto is leaning into fairness issuance by way of a $5 billion at-the-market providing—an method that, by definition, tends to lean on the premium slightly than defend it. NYDIG’s counsel is blunt: preserve some money again “to assist shares by way of buybacks.”
Beyond near-term market mechanics, NYDIG sketches what a subsequent part of maturation may appear like: accretive M&A and even shareholder activism amongst DATs. Because accretion is a operate of relative premium, an acquirer buying and selling at the next NAV premium than a goal can enhance its bitcoin-per-share depend by means of a inventory deal even when the goal shouldn’t be at a reduction. If this logic takes maintain, the consolidators will possible be corporations that may maintain larger premiums and function at adequate scale to execute significant transactions.
What Does This Mean For The Bitcoin Price?
Crucially for bitcoin-cycle watchers, NYDIG revisits the one historic analogue accessible for this rising sign: MicroStrategy’s premium to NAV peaked in February 2021, previous bitcoin’s April 2021 intermediate high close to $64,000 and properly earlier than the last word November 2021 prime round $69,000. In the present cycle, NYDIG observes that MicroStrategy’s premium topped out in November 2024—a timing element that “could also be telling us one thing concerning the present bitcoin cycle,” even when the agency stresses that one instance doesn’t make a rule. “There could also be some cycle data being conveyed in DAT premiums, however the pattern measurement is small.”
NYDIG’s market-tape appendix underlines the transition temper. Bitcoin declined over the previous weeks, whereas broader US equities have been largely flat. Precious metals, in the meantime, broke larger following Jackson Hole as falling nominal charges and sticky inflation expectations pushed actual yields decrease—macro circumstances NYDIG argues also needs to favor BTC alongside gold and silver into September’s CPI print and the September 17 FOMC resolution.
The analysis home stops in need of making a hard-timing name. But the contours are clear: a once-buoyant premium regime for bitcoin treasuries is being wrung out by provide, issuance, and technique convergence; administration groups could have to pivot from opportunistic fairness faucets to defensive buybacks; and if historical past rhymes, the trajectory of MicroStrategy’s premium—peaking months forward of bitcoin’s final highs—could once more be whispering the place we’re within the cycle. As NYDIG frames it, the “sign” embedded in DAT premiums is getting louder, even when the dataset is younger.
At press time, bitcoin traded at $111,373.
