Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin’s declaration that “ETH is a store of value, ETH is money” became a point of validation for Bitmine Immersion Technologies’ accumulation strategy, according to chairman Tom Lee.
As Decrypt reported in its article published November 10, 2026, at 01:08:21 UTC+8, Bitmine said Monday it had added 9,587 ETH worth roughly $20 million. The company has bought Ethereum every week since launching its treasury strategy on June 30, 2025.
A monetary narrative, with different emphases
Speaking at Devcon in Mumbai, Buterin said: “I’ve finally made up my mind, ETH is a store of value, ETH is money.” In a subsequent X post, he explained that fee-burning was weaker than he had once thought and that optimizing for it could conflict with decentralization.
Lee called the declaration “a seismic shift.” He argued that ETH functions as “pristine and trusted collateral,” rather than a cash-flow token, and linked that interpretation to what he described as a coming “supercycle of tokenization and AI.” He also framed Buterin’s reasoning as consistent with Ethereum’s roadmap and its role in tokenization.
Those forecasts and claims about ETH’s role are Lee’s interpretation—not outcomes established by Buterin’s statement.
The buying strategy behind the message
Bitmine reported holdings of 6,070,092 ETH, or 4.97% of Ethereum’s 122.2 million token supply. By the company’s calculation, that put it 99% of the way toward its goal of owning 5% of the supply—a target it calls the “Alchemy of 5%”—after just 15 months.
The documented development is a corporate treasury adopting Buterin’s monetary framing to explain its purchases. The source does not establish a broader community response to that framing.
Disclosure: Decrypt reported that Tom Lee is one of several investors in Dastan, its parent company.