JPMorgan: MicroStrategy should rebuild dollar reserves

JPMorgan analysts recommend MicroStrategy replenish its U.S. dollar reserves after the company sold 32 bitcoin, according to a report published Friday. The analysts said the sale, which they described as symbolic and voluntary, raised investor concerns about the firm’s short-term funding for dividend payments.

Analysts led by Nikolaos Panigirtzoglou calculated that MicroStrategy’s current dollar reserves would cover roughly 6.3 months of its preferred-stock dividend payments. Preferred dividends total about $1.7 billion a year, and the analysts wrote that rebuilding those reserves might be needed to reduce investor concern that the company would sell additional bitcoin to meet dividend obligations.

MicroStrategy established a $1.44 billion dollar reserve in December to protect preferred dividends and to service interest on outstanding debt. The company currently holds 843,706 bitcoin at an average cost of $75,699, which the analysts estimated produces an approximate paper loss of $11.5 billion at current market prices.

MicroStrategy’s co-founder and executive chairman, Michael Saylor, posted on X: “A good time to add more dots.” JPMorgan’s team expects the company to continue buying bitcoin. If MicroStrategy’s year-to-date buying pace persists, the analysts revised their projection to about $32 billion of bitcoin purchases in 2026, up from roughly $22 billion in both 2025 and 2024 and higher than a prior $30 billion estimate.

The report lowered JPMorgan’s earlier 2026 view on digital assets from overweight to cautious. The analysts flagged weaker capital flows into the sector and growing regulatory uncertainty in the United States as reasons for the change in stance. They estimated total digital asset inflows at about $22 billion year-to-date, which annualizes to roughly $52 billion-around half the pace seen in 2025.

Regulatory progress in Washington is a key factor in the bank’s outlook. JPMorgan placed the probability of passage this year for the U.S. market structure bill for crypto, often called the Clarity Act, at under 50%, citing a narrow window with midterm elections approaching and ongoing debates over stablecoin rules.

Price dynamics also influenced the reassessment. The analysts noted bitcoin spent most of the year trading below their estimated production cost. Their central production-cost estimate fell from $90,000 at the start of the year to about $77,000 after declines in hashrate and mining difficulty, then moved back toward $87,000 more recently. Bitcoin was trading near $62,000 at the time of the report.

The analysts wrote that current weak sentiment in crypto markets might become a “bullish contrarian signal” over time, while adding that a stronger second half of the year would be conditional on MicroStrategy clarifying how it will meet dividend obligations and on approval of additional U.S. crypto market rules. The report also noted that altcoins such as Ethereum are unlikely to meaningfully outperform bitcoin without stronger on-chain activity and broader real-world adoption.