Saylor Hints at New BTC Buy, Strategy Eyes Semi-Monthly Dividends

In a video presentation to shareholders shared by Saylor on Friday, Strategy CEO Phong Le said the company hopes to pay dividends twice a month — on the 15th and again at the end of each month — for a total of 24 a year at the current rate of 11.5%.

“What do we think this will do, it should stabilize the price, dampen cyclicality, drive further liquidity and grow demand,” Le said.

A preliminary proxy filing was sent to the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday. The definitive proxy filing is expected on April 28, when voting opens to approve or reject the measure. Voting closes on June 8 at the annual shareholder meeting, with the new schedule expected to start mid-July if approved.

Strategy is proposing to pay semi-monthly dividends on $STRC, instead of monthly. No change to the annual dividend obligations or dividend rate. These proposed changes are intended to stabilize price, dampen cyclicality, drive liquidity, and grow demand.

Demand plunging after dividend dates, said Le

Le said one of the main reasons for the proposed change was to address a drop in demand after investors were no longer eligible for the upcoming dividend, which cooled buying activity and slowed the pace of new share sales.

“If we were to move forward with paying STRC to semi-monthly, we would be in category 1, the only preferred in the world that pays semi-monthly dividends. We think this is unique and this is attractive,” he added.

The company went through dozens of iterations before settling on the semi-monthly schedule and had considered weekly and even daily dividend record dates. The NASDAQ stock exchange, which lists Strategys stock, follows industry rules requiring a minimum gap of ten days between the record date and the payment date, according to Le.

Strategy has the largest Bitcoin (BTC) stash among publicly traded companies with 780,897 coins, worth $58.2 billion, according to Bitbo. Its also one of the most frequent buyers with regular weekly purchases.

The company‘s stock (MSTR) jumped 11.8% on Friday to $166.52. It’s still down more than 47% over the past year, according to Google Finance.

Strategys Bitcoin buying comes despite the company sitting on significant unrealized losses on its holdings. Earlier this month, Strategy reported in its first-quarter financial results that its unrealized losses on digital assets amounted to $14.46 billion.