The broader digital asset market faces a severe liquidity contraction after strong May U.S. jobs data neutralized expectations for near-term Federal Reserve rate cuts and a four-year counterfeiting bug in Zcash shook confidence in blockchain security. In the middle of this market drawdown, BitMine Immersion Technologies, led by Chairman Tom Lee, priced an upsized preferred stock offering on Friday to defend its Ethereum strategy.
The company is selling 3.5 million shares of newly created Series A Perpetual Preferred Stock at $80 per share, expecting to raise approximately $273.8 million in gross proceeds. The new securities carry a 9.50% cumulative annual dividend to be paid in cash. BitMine expects the deal to close on June 10 and applied to list the shares on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker BMNP.
BitMine currently holds approximately 5.4 million Ethereum, accounting for roughly 4.5% of the global circulating supply. The firm intends to use the capital raise to acquire additional Ethereum, fund staking infrastructure through its MAVAN validator network, and potentially buy back common stock. However, following a recent price drop that pulled Ethereum to around $1,591, BitMine is sitting on unrealized paper losses exceeding $9 billion. The company originally planned to issue only 3 million shares before upsizing the offering.
The financial maneuver copies the corporate treasury strategy pioneered by Bitcoin accumulator MicroStrategy. That firm previously launched its own perpetual preferred stock offering with an 11.5% dividend to fund digital asset purchases. BitMine is the first major firm to apply this specific dividend-paying corporate structure to the Ethereum ecosystem.
How Preferred Equity Protects Underwater Digital Asset Treasuries
The issuance of perpetual preferred stock provides a specific survival mechanism for corporate treasuries operating at a loss. By offering a 9.50% fixed dividend, BitMine secures nine-figure funding without liquidating its depreciated Ethereum reserves. The company plans to service these cash obligations using the staking yields generated by its underlying network infrastructure.
This allows the firm to bypass issuing highly dilutive common stock at market bottoms. BitMine’s common stock recently traded near $16, marking a 41% decline since the start of the year. The preferred equity structure allows management to maintain their long-term accumulation targets while insulating the underlying treasury from immediate market volatility.