Peter Thiel dumps all ETH treasury shares after “Ethereum’s MicroStrategy” fell 95% since August

Peter Thiel went to zero in ETHZilla, and the ETH treasury firm commerce simply obtained much more actual

On Feb. 17, an amended 13G/A posted to ETHZilla’s investor website listed Peter Thiel and Founders Fund-related autos at zero shares and 0.0% useful possession.

The filing additionally stamped a “date of occasion” of Dec. 31, 2025, which units the timing body for what the doc captures, a useful possession snapshot that arrives on a compliance clock.

Bloomberg is reporting that Thiel and his Founders Fund have, in reality, totally exited the corporate, finishing a easy arc that has been constructing for months.

Back in August 2025, the Palantir founder was a big stakeholder. A Schedule 13D submitting reported 11,592,241 shares and seven.5% useful possession, with an occasion date of Aug. 4. The place then shrank. An modification filed Nov. 14, reported 928,389 shares and 5.6% as of Sept. 30.

That sequence turns into extra compelling if you keep in mind what ETHZilla got down to signify: a public-market try to bottle the Strategy (previously MicroStrategy) playbook and pour it over Ethereum, with a Nasdaq ticker and a treasury story aimed toward buyers preferring brokerages to wallets.

The submitting that turns the rumor right into a quantity

The Feb. 17 modification is the crispest model of “totally exited” that public markets ever hand you, however it appears the shareholders had already priced this in after Thiel’s 2025 gross sales. Since August final 12 months, ETHZ shares have declined by 95%, from round $74 to only over $3.50.

The firm was clearly beneath strain from greater than insider promoting. In a Jan. 2026 8-K, ETHZilla reported promoting 3,965.83 ETH for $12.58 million at a mean worth of $3,173.67, and it disclosed a remaining stability of roughly 65,850 ETH. A month earlier, there was a a lot bigger sale, about $74.5 million in ETH, tied to debt strain and a step again from the pure treasury posture.

In a Feb. 2026 8-K, the corporate disclosed it redeemed all excellent senior secured convertible notes, paying $516.148 million in principal and $87.745 million as a redemption premium, plus curiosity.

That is the sound of high-priced capital in a market that has began pricing treasury-company constructions with much less endurance.

All of this lands inside a wider story that has been forming throughout the class.

Crypto-treasury corporations have been leaning on buybacks and leverage as fairness costs sag, and that broader context provides Thiel’s “0.0%” a special form of gravity.

The macro drawback, carry appears skinny and financing appears pricey

A treasury technique at all times finally ends up residing contained in the macro. In the simple part of this commerce, the fairness trades at a premium to the underlying crypto, financing turns into the gas, and the loop feeds itself. ETH has an additional layer right here, as a result of staking yield and derivatives carry grow to be inputs within the spreadsheet.

Right now, these inputs learn as modest cushions.

Public dashboards monitoring ETH futures foundation present annualized carry within the low single digits throughout maturities. Staking yield benchmarks sit in the identical neighborhood, with one index round 2.8% annualized.

When the carry is skinny, administration choices matter extra. ETH gross sales matter extra. Debt phrases matter extra. Equity issuance phrases matter extra. And the market begins treating the ticker as a judgment on execution relatively than a easy proxy.

Treasury-company trades in the end relaxation on the idea {that a} public wrapper can maintain a risky asset and stay steady when the market shifts. Thiel’s exit doesn’t clarify the why, but it does plant a flag on the finish of a timeline.

Three paths from right here, and the numbers that may let you know which one you might be in

It helps to call the forks within the highway and fix every fork to a small set of observable indicators.

1. One path is a premium loop reopening. ETH stabilizes, danger urge for food returns, and treasury firms regain room to finance progress with out shrinking the core pile. The tells present up within the filings, fewer treasury reductions, cleaner raises, and a market prepared to pay for publicity once more.
2. A second path is a reduction lure. The fairness trades as a continual low cost to the underlying holdings, and the corporate funds operations, acquisitions, and debt service by promoting a part of the pile. That model strikes slowly, and it reveals up as a gentle drip of “treasury replace” math.
3. A 3rd path is a reflexive unwind. A pointy ETH drawdown meets tight financing situations, compelled gross sales speed up, and the fairness begins behaving like a stress gauge. That model will get loud in headlines, and it normally leaves fingerprints briefly home windows of repeated stability sheet actions.

We also can use a easy numeric body to maintain the deal with actuality. ETHZilla disclosed roughly 65,850 ETH remaining in its Jan. 2026 8-K. A previous disclosure path famous 19,301,223 shares excellent, and that share depend provides us a tough technique to translate ETH worth into “per share” instinct.

At $2,000 ETH, 65,850 ETH involves about $131.7 million of ETH worth. Spread throughout 19.3 million shares, that lands round $6.80 per share in ETH worth earlier than money, liabilities, working burn, and different stability sheet objects enter the image.

At $1,500 ETH, the tough determine sits nearer to $5.10. At $3,000 ETH, it rises to round $10.20. The level right here is the sensitivity, small strikes in ETH and small modifications in financing phrases can swing the story quick.

What to observe subsequent, the submitting breadcrumbs that preserve this from turning into a one-day meme

Start with the ETH stability. The subsequent time ETHZilla updates that quantity in an 8-K or a periodic report, path issues, and magnitude issues.

Then watch the capital construction. The debt redemption disclosed within the Feb. 2026 8-K got here with a big premium, and any substitute financing, fairness issuance, or new structured instrument will let you know what sort of market entry the corporate nonetheless has.

Then watch the technique floor space. The extra the corporate leans into adjoining bets and broader asset themes, the extra the ticker turns into a view on administration’s capacity to maintain a coherent story beneath strain. That stress reveals up within the firm’s personal prospectus language round shares and promoting stockholders.

Finally, preserve the macro dials in view, as a result of they set the ceiling on how simple this commerce can get. The futures basis curve and staking yield ranges usually are not aspect trivia, they feed straight into how treasury-company methods look on paper and the way they really feel in a drawdown.

Lots of crypto narratives finish in vibes. This one ends in a line merchandise, and the road merchandise reads 0.0%. Thield’s conviction on this Ethereum treasury car was short-lived, so the query turns into – what does he know that different Ethereum buyers do not? Was it poor investor relations with ETHZilla or a extra broader challenge with the enterprise mannequin?

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