BitMine Buys Another 20,000 ETH From Kraken, Closing In on Its 5% Supply Goal

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• BitMine received 20,000 ETH, worth about $48.89 million, from a Kraken hot wallet early Wednesday, according to on-chain records.
• The purchase leaves the company roughly 167,000 ETH short of its stated goal of holding 5% of all ether in circulation.
• ETH traded near $2,457 as the transfer landed, down 1.6% over 24 hours after a sharper intraday drop.

On-chain records show a Kraken hot wallet sent 20,000 ETH, worth about $48.89 million, to a wallet linked to BitMine Immersion Technologies early Wednesday.  A much smaller transfer, 0.01 ETH worth about $24.69, moved through the same wallet roughly seven hours earlier. Traders commonly send a dust-sized test transaction ahead of a large one to confirm a wallet address before committing real size, and the timing here fits that pattern. The latest accumulation also follows a separate BitMine-linked wallet pulling in 13,000 ETH from BitGo on August 11, 2026, highlighting the company’s continued activity in the Ethereum market.

Closing In on the “Alchemy of 5%”

BitMine, the Nasdaq-listed company chaired by Fundstrat’s Tom Lee, has spent 2026 converting its balance sheet into the largest corporate ether treasury on record. In its last public disclosure, dated Aug. 24, BitMine said it held 5.85 million ETH, equal to about 4.84% of Ethereum’s total supply and, in the company’s own words, “97% of the way” to what Lee has branded the “Alchemy of 5%,” a self-set target of owning 5% of every ETH in existence.

Added to that confirmed base, Wednesday’s purchase would put BitMine’s holdings at roughly 5.868 million ETH, or about 4.86% of supply, closing close to one-tenth of the ground it had left to cover. BitMine has not yet issued a new disclosure confirming that updated total; the figure here is calculated from the company’s last confirmed count plus this transaction, not from a fresh company statement.

Buying Through a Down Day

“ETH gained 30% in the past week. This is the largest weekly gain since May 2025, prior to that it was July 2021. In those two precedent instances, this weekly gain of >30% signaled a launch point for a larger move in ETH.”

ETH gained 30% in the past week. This is the largest weekly gain since May 2025, prior to that it was July 2021. In those two precedent instances, this weekly gain of >30% signaled a launch point for a larger moveThat was Lee’s reasoning in BitMine’s Aug. 24 disclosure for why the company kept buying through the summer rally. The read looks less clean this week. ETH opened Tuesday near $2,497, slid to an intraday low around $2,420, and had recovered only to about $2,456 by the time Wednesday’s transfer landed, a 1.6% decline over 24 hours.. BitMine’s buying pace has not tracked the week-to-week price swings; the company has kept accumulating on both green and red days since it began the strategy.

At its recent run rate, roughly 32,000 ETH a week according to the company’s own recent disclosures, BitMine could close the remaining gap to its 5% target within a matter of weeks if that pace holds. Whether it does now depends less on Wednesday’s transfer than on whether Lee’s read of the ETH market continues to hold up against a price chart that spent the past day moving the other way.