Metaplanet Inc., known as “Japan's MicroStrategy” on Crypto Twitter, has outperformed every other company on the Japanese stock market since the beginning of the week.
Over the past two days, Metaplanet's stock price has risen 50%, from Monday's closing price of 41 yen to 90 yen as of Wednesday. This is the second consecutive trading session of Metaplanet, enforced by the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE), to reach a daily high.
Following in the footsteps of MicroStrategy (MSTR), the world's largest Bitcoin holder, Metaplanet's new main corporate goal is to accumulate as many Bitcoins as possible.
“We believe this is the most valuable thing we can do for our shareholders,” Dylan LeClair, director of Bitcoin strategy at Metaplanet, told Decrypt. “We will consider various options to acquire additional Bitcoin, including any opportunities that exist in the capital markets that we see as increasing.”
One of those opportunities, announced Monday, involves increasing the number of shares outstanding by 300%, a strategy MicroStrategy has already used multiple times. The company can raise capital through the new stock sale and accumulate more bitcoin, turning Metaplanet into a makeshift bitcoin ETF for Japanese investors, with no fees.
“Given the absolute scarcity of the asset, we plan to continue purchasing Bitcoin regardless of short-term exchange rate fluctuations. This is in stark contrast to the reality of permanent depreciation of political currencies.” LeClair added.
Bitcoin has risen 193% against the yen over the past year, and on Monday hit a new all-time high against the rapidly depreciating currency.
Similar to MicroStrategy in August 2020, after announcing a Bitcoin treasury strategy last month, Metaplanet's stock price quickly skyrocketed, with its market capitalization rising from 2 billion yen (approximately $13 million) in early April to now 146. The amount rose to 300 million yen (approximately $93.4 million).
“When it comes to Metaplanet, just like Bitcoin, the best strategy is: [to] Just buy it,” Mark Yusko, CEO and CIO of Morgan Creek Capital, tweeted on Wednesday. Yusko serves on Metaplanet's board of directors.
Metaplanet is currently available only on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and is closed to investors in the United States. However, Arnab Naskar, co-founder of STOKR, who recently helped tokenize MSTR stock on the Liquid network, recently expressed interest in doing the same with Metaplanet, which could lead to worldwide access to virtual currency users could expand.
Edited by Ryan Ozawa.
