More Public Companies Filed to Add Ether to Their Balance Sheets Last Month Than Bitcoin. One of Them Now Holds Almost 5 Percent of the Supply.

By Kresmion Research, July 14, 2026

Over the past month, six different public companies told the SEC they were putting ether on their balance sheets. Five said the same about bitcoin. For most of the last two years the count ran the other way, with bitcoin as the default corporate reserve asset and ether an afterthought. That order has quietly evened out and then tipped, and one company now holds close to a twentieth of all the ether that exists. The strange part is what the price has done while this happened, which is almost nothing.

This is a note about who is buying ether right now and who is not. It is not a forecast and it is not advice. The point is that the demand for ether has changed shape in a way that a chart of the price alone will not show you.

Who is filing to buy ether

Kresmion tracks corporate treasury disclosures as they hit SEC EDGAR. In the 30 days through July 14, six distinct public companies, counted by their SEC filer ID, filed 8-K documents referencing ether treasury activity, against five for bitcoin. Bitcoin still had more filings in raw count, eleven to ten, because a few of its holders file often. Ether edged ahead on the number of separate names.

The ether names are not obscure. BitMine Immersion filed four times in the window, on June 22, June 29, July 6 and July 13. SharpLink filed twice. Bit Digital, TON Strategy, StableCoinX and LiveOne round out the list. The scale sits with the first two. BitMine reported holdings of 5,770,038 ether, about 4.8 percent of the circulating supply, and roughly 11.3 billion dollars in total crypto and cash, after adding 27,801 ether in its most recent update. SharpLink reported 886,725 ether and stakes close to all of it for yield.

There is a rotation inside these numbers. In the same week BitMine added about 42,000 ether, worth around 74 million dollars, Strategy, the company that built the original bitcoin treasury model, was trimming bitcoin. The marginal balance-sheet buyer of crypto this month was reaching for ether, not bitcoin.

Why ether and why now

Bitcoin's pitch to a corporate treasury is scarcity. It sits on the balance sheet and does nothing, which is the whole idea. Ether offers something bitcoin by design does not: a native yield. Staked ether earns a return paid in more ether, so a treasury that holds it and stakes it is not holding a dormant asset, it is holding one that pays a coupon. SharpLink staking nearly its entire position is the clearest expression of that logic.

The timing has a second driver. The regulatory picture for holding ether on a US balance sheet has cleared this year, and BitMine has framed its buying explicitly around that shift. When the rules were uncertain, a treasurer could defend bitcoin as digital gold and little else. With the framework settled, ether becomes defensible as a yield-bearing reserve. Those two facts, a coupon and a clearer rulebook, are enough to explain why the corporate flow turned toward ether without needing any view on the price.

The bid that does not move the price

Here is the part that complicates the story. Ether is flat. It traded near 1,786 dollars on the morning of July 14, up less than 1 percent over the week. A wave of corporate buying that leaves the price unchanged means something on the other side is absorbing it.

Two things are. Ether's own US exchange traded funds are not helping. They saw a small net outflow of about 15.4 million dollars on July 13, after a small inflow of 18.4 million dollars on July 10. The ETF channel, which did most of the ether buying earlier this month, has gone quiet to slightly negative. For contrast, bitcoin's ETFs saw a much larger outflow the same day, about 425 million dollars by Farside's count.

The larger offset is on chain. Ether's biggest tracked wallets have been net depositors to exchanges, not withdrawers, on 9 of the last 12 days, including 46.1 million dollars of net deposits on July 13 and 177.3 million dollars on July 7, roughly 600 million dollars in net inflows across the two weeks once same owner transfers between an exchange's own wallets are stripped out. Coins moving toward exchanges is the opposite of the hoarding pattern, and it is the mechanical counterweight to the treasury buying. The honest caveat is size. That 600 million dollars is about 0.3 percent of ether's roughly 215 billion dollar market value, so it is a direction, not a flood. The treasury buying and the exchange deposits are both real and both modest against the size of the asset, which is exactly why the price has gone nowhere.

The strongest evidence against this read

The cleanest objection is concentration. The wide company count is real, but the dollars are not evenly spread. BitMine alone is most of the ether being bought, and one company holding 4.8 percent of the supply is a single point of failure, not a broad base of demand. These treasuries fund their buying by issuing their own stock at a premium to the crypto they hold. If that premium fades, the buying does not just slow, it can reverse, which is the same reflexive machinery that has made the bitcoin treasury trade fragile in its own down cycles.

The second objection is that an 8-K reference is not a verified purchase. Kresmion's on chain confirmation flag is false on every one of these filings, and most disclose no dollar amount. That is why the size in this note rests on the two holders whose totals are independently reported, BitMine and SharpLink, rather than on the raw filing count. The count tells you the breadth of interest. It does not by itself prove the coins were bought.

Put those together and the modest claim survives while the grand one does not. More companies are choosing ether over bitcoin for their treasuries this month, and that is new. Whether it is a durable base of demand or one large buyer plus a crowd of small ones depends on names beyond BitMine writing real checks.

What would change the read

Watch next month's filing count. If ether keeps pace with or passes bitcoin again, the shift is a trend rather than a single month's cluster. Watch for the first 8-K that discloses an ether sale by one of these treasuries, the ether version of Strategy trimming bitcoin, because a corporate seller would break the idea of a sticky balance-sheet bid. And watch the ether ETF flows: if they turn firmly negative while the filings keep coming, it confirms that ether's demand is migrating from funds to balance sheets rather than growing on both.

Key takeaways

Frequently asked questions

Why would a company hold ether instead of bitcoin in its treasury?

The practical difference is yield. Ether can be staked to earn a native return paid in more ether, so a treasury that holds and stakes it collects an ongoing payment. Bitcoin has no equivalent mechanism and is held purely as a scarce reserve asset. A clearer US regulatory framework for holding ether this year removed a barrier that had kept most treasurers on bitcoin.

Does more corporate buying mean the ether price should rise?

Not on its own. Over the past two weeks corporate treasuries were buying while ether's ETFs were flat to slightly negative and its largest wallets were sending coins toward exchanges. Those offsetting flows are why ether was roughly unchanged on the week despite the filings. Buying by one group does not move a price when the other flows lean the other way.

How reliable is the count of treasury filings?

It measures filing activity, not confirmed purchases. Kresmion's on chain confirmation flag is false on all of these 8-K references and most disclose no dollar figure. The dollar scale in this note comes from BitMine and SharpLink, whose ether totals are independently reported, rather than from the filing count itself.

What is the single most important caveat?

Concentration. The number of companies choosing ether is broad, but the dollars are not. BitMine holds most of the ether being bought and roughly 4.8 percent of all supply. A demand base that leans on one stock-financed buyer is more fragile than the wide company count suggests.

Sources

Kresmion corporate treasury tracker, SEC EDGAR 8-K filings, 30 days through July 14, 2026: 6 distinct companies by SEC filer ID (CIK) referencing ether treasury activity and 5 referencing bitcoin; 10 ether filings and 11 bitcoin filings. Ether filers: BitMine Immersion (June 22, June 29, July 6, July 13), SharpLink (June 23, June 30), Bit Digital, TON Strategy, StableCoinX and LiveOne.

BitMine Immersion Technologies holdings update, July 13, 2026: 5,770,038 ether, about 4.8 percent of supply, roughly 11.3 billion dollars in total crypto and cash. CoinDesk: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2026/07/13/tom-lee-s-bitmine-raises-ether-holdings-to-usd5-77-million-or-4-8-of-supply and PR Newswire: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/bitmine-immersion-technologies-bmnr-announces-eth-holdings-reach-5-77-million-tokens-and-total-crypto-and-total-cash-holdings-of-11-3-billion-302823523.html

BitMine added about 42,000 ether, roughly 74 million dollars, around July 6, 2026 while Strategy trimmed bitcoin. CoinDesk: https://www.coindesk.com/business/2026/07/06/bitmine-added-another-usd74-million-in-ether-as-tom-lee-bets-on-clarity-act-boost

SharpLink ether treasury of 886,725 ether, staked for yield, late June 2026. News.Bitcoin.com: https://news.bitcoin.com/sharplink-adds-10000-eth-as-corporate-treasury-grows-to-886725-ether/

Kresmion ETF flow data, crypto_etf_aggregate: ether net flow minus 15.4 million dollars on July 13, 2026 and plus 18.4 million dollars on July 10, 2026.

Farside Investors, US spot bitcoin ETF flows, July 13, 2026, about minus 425 million dollars net. https://farside.co.uk/btc/

Kresmion on chain whale tracker, whale_transactions with same owner transfers excluded: ether net exchange inflows on 9 of the last 12 days through July 14, 2026, including 46.1 million dollars on July 13 and 177.3 million dollars on July 7.

Kresmion market data, July 14, 2026: ether about 1,786 dollars, up less than 1 percent over the prior seven days.