Who are the big winners behind the trillion-dollar cryptocurrency treasury boom?

By: Julie Goldenberg, Forbes

Translated by: Luffy, Foresight News

Today, the number of publicly traded companies adding cryptocurrency to their balance sheets has reached a record high. Ostensibly, they aim to diversify portfolios, hedge against inflation, and attract new investors; unspoken, of course, is management’s desire to boost stock prices. In recent months, merely announcing a so-called "crypto treasury" strategy has been enough to earn companies a market premium.

Yet the real wealth boom is flowing to the “pickaxe sellers” of this latest gold rush: custodians, brokers, asset managers, and investment banks that collect fees on every transaction, transfer, and storage.

The trend has become “feverish” over the past six months and created a “contagion effect,” said Nathan McCauley, co-founder and CEO of San Francisco-based Anchorage Digital. The crypto bank has already secured major deals, including custody of Trump Media Group’s $2 billion bitcoin treasury and Nakamoto Holdings’ $760 million in assets. Nakamoto Holdings, a bitcoin-focused firm, recently announced a merger via SPAC with KindlyMD, a small, loss-making medical company based in Salt Lake City whose stock had long traded below $2 before the May announcement. Now, named after bitcoin’s anonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto, Nakamoto Holdings is listed on Nasdaq (ticker: NAKA) at $15 per share, with a market cap of $114 million.

According to Bitcoin Treasuries.net, just one year ago, a handful of corporate buyers collectively held slightly over 416,000 bitcoins; today, at least 152 public companies hold more than 950,000 bitcoins worth over $110 billion. The undisputed “whale” remains Strategy Inc., led by billionaire Michael Saylor. The company pioneered the corporate crypto treasury model, aggressively using innovative financing tools like convertible bonds and floating-rate perpetual preferred shares. Originally a small software firm called MicroStrategy based in Tysons Corner, Virginia, Strategy Inc. now holds $73 billion in bitcoin, yet its market capitalization stands at $95 billion—representing a 25% premium over its crypto holdings.

Companies emulating Strategy aren’t just buying bitcoin—they’re also acquiring ethereum, Solana, and other digital assets. According to Architect Partners, a Palo Alto-based crypto advisory firm, corporations have raised over $98 billion for such investments this year alone; since June, another 139 companies have pledged $59 billion. The latest example: World Liberty Financial, a crypto firm controlled by the Trump family, recently announced a $1.5 billion treasury centered around its native token WLFI—this not including Trump Media Group’s $2 billion bitcoin treasury.

Companies profiting from the rise of corporate crypto treasuries

Because the trend is still in its early stages, its full impact is hard to quantify, but the frenzy has already “sparked massive fee income across the board,” said Elliot Chun of Architect Partners.

For traditional investment banks and broker-dealers like Morgan Stanley, Barclays Capital, Moelis & Company, and TD Securities, underwriting commissions and other fees from preferred share and convertible bond offerings have become a lucrative business.

Take Strategy’s March issuance of 8.5 million preferred shares raising $722 million. Morgan Stanley and about a dozen other institutions acted as underwriters, likely earning around $10 million in fees. In July, MARA Holdings, a cryptocurrency mining company based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, issued $950 million in convertible bonds—an arrangement that could net Morgan Stanley and others involved roughly $10 million.

Another group benefiting from the crypto treasury surge are “qualified custodians”—firms that safeguard digital assets for clients. Take BitGo, a veteran firm based in Palo Alto. Thanks to the crypto market boom and expanding corporate treasuries, its assets under custody surpassed $100 billion in the first half of 2025.

“This [corporate treasury] segment is growing as a percentage of our business. Six months ago it wasn’t much, but now it makes up a significant portion of new clients,” said Adam Sporn, head of BitGoPrime brokerage and U.S. institutional sales. He estimates about 24 crypto treasury-related firms have announced custody partnerships with BitGo in just the past few months. This surge has also paved the way for BitGo to secretly file for an IPO in July.

Top 20 bitcoin treasury companies

Major custodians like BitGo and Coinbase charge institutional clients setup fees, annual fees, and add-on fees tied to custody services and helping clients earn yield. Ravi Doshi, co-head of global markets at FalconX, said the most common model is an annual fee based on assets under custody, typically ranging from 0.15% to 0.30%, though large clients can negotiate down to 0.10%.

While these fees translate into hundreds of millions in revenue for custodians managing billions in bitcoin, profit margins on custody deals are often thin. Dan Dolev, senior fintech analyst at Mizuho Securities, noted that the crypto demand generated by these “intermediaries” also brings additional income for exchanges and brokers like Coinbase, FalconX, and Cumberland: purchases drive price increases, attract new investors, and stimulate further token trading—a self-reinforcing cycle.

Beyond trading and custody, staking, lending, and options overlay services represent another lucrative frontier. Staking involves locking tokens to help validate blockchain transactions and earn rewards; options strategies allow portfolio risk-return profiles to be adjusted via financial derivatives without altering underlying asset allocations.

“Once these companies raise funds and put them on their balance sheets, they quickly face the question of ‘what next?’” said Chun of Architect Partners. “Over $60 billion in crypto assets need to generate returns—and these public companies can’t do it themselves.” Sidney Powell, CEO of Melbourne-based crypto lending firm Maple Finance, noted that companies currently rely solely on appreciation of underlying assets for returns, but the rapid spread of the crypto treasury trend will force firms to differentiate through yield-generating strategies or low-cost funding to buy more bitcoin.

Juan Leon, senior investment strategist at crypto asset manager Bitwise, said these companies may increasingly turn to institutional lenders like Two Prime and Maple Finance, or asset managers like Wave Digital Assets, Arca, and Galaxy—which typically charge 25 to 50 basis points for treasury management services. Earlier this month, Galaxy reported $175 million in inflows to its treasury management business, partly due to providing solutions for about 20 clients holding crypto treasuries.

In the meantime, Wall Street is fueling the frenzy. Encouraged by the Trump administration’s friendlier policy environment and clearer regulatory frameworks, firms like Capital Group, hedge fund D1 Capital Partners, and investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald are actively funding corporate crypto accumulation.

Despite lingering skeptics, the crypto treasury wave has only just begun. “We believe eventually every company will become a crypto treasury company in some form.” said Leon. Global corporate cash reserves currently stand at around $31 trillion. “Whether they allocate 1%, 10%, or 100% of their balance sheet to crypto, they’ll hold some. So we still have a long runway ahead.”