Merger of Twenty One with Strike and Elektron may portend the future for digital asset treasury companies

Twenty One Capital, the bitcoin-native company established by Strike CEO Jack Mallers, Tether, and SoftBank via a merger with Cantor Equity Partners, announced plans to acquire financial services company Strike and global bitcoin-mining platform Elektron. The move comes at a time when cracks in the digital asset treasury (DAT) ecosystem are widening.

Shares popped on the news, but remain down over 12% year to date.

“The strategy is structured around consolidation, incorporating mergers and acquisitions, and is intended to bring together Bitcoin treasury, mining, financial services, and capital markets into a single platform,” the press release explains, while Tether said in a separate press release that this “would position XXI to become the premier listed Bitcoin company in the world.” The company also intends to securitize its loan book and mining revenue.

Twenty One and Tether’s proposal comes at a time when many DATs are struggling, as bitcoin attempts to regain momentum, pushing some to sell off their bitcoin holdings to survive.

Twenty One began trading on December 9, 2025, when bitcoin’s price was in the mid- to high $90,000s. Today, bitcoin remains stuck in a tight range at the high $70,000 level.  

Nic Puckrin, cofounder of Coin Bureau, told Sherwood News that while the Tether proposal is “sensible,” the writing is on the wall for bitcoin treasury companies.

“The market is realizing it simply isn’t a strong long-term company model. This merger would give Twenty One an easy out at a time when the near-term future for the bitcoin price looks uncertain,” Puckrin said.

Puckrin said the solution won’t be as simple for other bitcoin DATs, as many have suffered much bigger share price drops, such as Nakamoto, down 99%, and Metaplanet, down 82% from its peak.

“In a year’s time, the DAT landscape could look much closer to its original roots, with Strategy and maybe two or three other surviving companies. It’ll be interesting to see who, if anyone, starts buying up the distressed DATs. It could be a way for the remaining players to acquire bitcoin at a very big discount,” Puckrin added.

On Wednesday at the 2026 Bitcoin Conference, Mallers said that “ideally, we’re interested in acquiring profitable bitcoin companies and strategic bitcoin assets,” making it a “conglomerate,” according to Bitcoin Treasuries.

“The idea of an energy resource-hungry, recurring income business working with an energy supplier and then linking them all with some good old-fashioned borrowing and lending is just good business sense,” Stephen Wundke, strategy and revenue director at Algoz, said. He added that if you think bitcoin is going to $300,000 in the next two years and 50% of the global population will own some crypto at that time, then you probably think this is a bargain.

TD Cowen Managing Director Lance Vitanza told Sherwood that the proposal is not surprising because Twenty One “hasn’t even commenced to operate as a bitcoin treasury; this is their first announcement.”

Vitanza said that he understands why they didn’t do anything for the past six months, but it feels like they’re giving up on the DAT model.

“They’re saying, ‘Actually, this is harder than it looks,’ and the reality is when bitcoin is going from 70K to 125K, then execution does not matter. When bitcoin goes from 125K to 70K, execution matters a lot.”  

Vitanza, who is a strong supporter of the DAT model, also noted the fact that they are merging with a miner, as he said the bitcoin treasury model, “when it’s run effectively, is clearly superior to bitcoin mining.”

In terms of the new company’s plan to securitize, Vitanza said that issuance of digital credit is “a huge driver of value creation for common stocks of companies that are embracing it.”

“I absolutely believe using the proceeds to add to their BTC treasury would a be a wise move if they can do that. They have scale to do this — that is what they should be doing. I’m not sure why they would want to dilute with a bitcoin miner,” he said.