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Michael Saylor (Jason Koerner/Getty Images)

Strategy announces $1.44 billion “US dollar reserve” to avoid participating in bitcoin fire sale

The digital treasury company also lowered its outlook for full-year operating income, net income, and earnings per share by more than 90% compared to its October 30 guidance.

Luke Kawa

Strategy exists to buy bitcoin.

It does not want to sell bitcoin. That’s the opposite of its raison d’être.

However, since Strategy has sold debt of various sorts to buy its roughly $56 billion in bitcoin, it owes interest and dividend payments. This raises the prospect that the firm might need to sell some of its crypto hoard in order to meet those obligations. On a podcast on Friday, CEO Phong Le said that “we would sell bitcoin if we needed to fund our dividend payments below 1x mNAV.”

(mNAV refers to the ratio of Strategy’s enterprise value to the value of its bitcoin holdings.)

To that end, the digital asset treasury company founded by Michael Saylor announced that it’s established a US dollar reserve of $1.44 billion, enough to cover 21 months of these payments. The aim is to have enough socked away to eventually cover two years or more of these obligations. This reserve was created from funds received by Strategy’s at-the-market share offering program.

Shares are sinking Monday morning, hitting their lowest levels since October 2024.

The move may help quell fears that Strategy would be caught up in a wave of bitcoin liquidations and potentially add more selling fuel to the fire. On this note, Saylor added that the USD reserve “will better position us to navigate short-term market volatility.”

Strategy also cut its outlook for bitcoin prices at year-end 2025 to a range of $85,000 to $100,000 (previously $150,000). As such, management also lowered its outlook for full-year operating income, net income, and earnings per share by more than 90% compared to their October 30 guidance.

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With their recent surge, Intel shares just hit their highest level since the dot-com era

Intel’s surge of nearly 60% this month has the iconic American chipmaker’s stock price approaching levels last seen during the dot-com era. Bloomberg noted that shares just touched their highest intraday level since the turn of the century:

The stock rose as much as 1.5% to $69.55, topping a peak it hit on Jan. 24, 2020. The shares are up 90% this year, after soaring 84% in 2025. Intel is now roughly 8% from its all-time closing high of $74.88, established on Aug. 31, 2000.

That’s just the most recent late-’90s-era throwback we’ve been seeing in tech shares lately. Oracle is currently pacing for its best week since late 1999.

What’s even more remarkable, however, is that Intel’s forward price-to-earnings ratio today dwarfs the premiums the market was putting on the stock during the nuttiness of the dot-com mania.

That reflects the fact that the recent run-up in Intel shares is, essentially, giving the chip giant credit for a massive turnaround that hasn’t actually happened yet.

One also might wonder if the fact that Intel is partially owned by the US government means it’s more attractive — and therefore worth a higher premium — than other chipmakers without the state imprimatur.

Still, kind of startling.

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Eli Lilly’s GLP-1 pill hit nearly 1,400 prescriptions in first week

Eli Lilly rose after preliminary numbers cited by Wall Street analysts showed strong uptake of its new weight-loss pill.

The FDA approved Foundayo on April 1 and shipments began on April 9. In its first week, roughly 1,400 US prescriptions were written for the drug, according to IQVIA data cited by Deustche Bank analysts in a Friday note.

Novo Nordisk, Lilly’s rival in the GLP-1 market, released its GLP-1 pill earlier this year, and early signs show that it’s expanding the market, inviting patients who were turned off by weekly injections. Novo’s pill had a stronger first week than Lilly’s, with its Wegovy pill hitting 3,071 US prescriptions in the first four days after its launch on January 5.

Lilly’s pill has an advantage over Novo’s, which is that it can be taken at any time of day, with or without food. Lilly disclosed in a February regulatory filing that it had $1.5 billion worth of prelaunch inventory ready ahead of the FDA approval — which is about as much as analysts polled by FactSet expect it to sell this year.

Novo Nordisk, Lilly’s rival in the GLP-1 market, released its GLP-1 pill earlier this year, and early signs show that it’s expanding the market, inviting patients who were turned off by weekly injections. Novo’s pill had a stronger first week than Lilly’s, with its Wegovy pill hitting 3,071 US prescriptions in the first four days after its launch on January 5.

Lilly’s pill has an advantage over Novo’s, which is that it can be taken at any time of day, with or without food. Lilly disclosed in a February regulatory filing that it had $1.5 billion worth of prelaunch inventory ready ahead of the FDA approval — which is about as much as analysts polled by FactSet expect it to sell this year.

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Critical Metals jumps after Greenland’s government approves CRML to take majority control of the Tanbreez mining project

Critical Metals is up more than 25% in premarket trading on Friday after the critical mining company announced that it now owns 92.5% of the Tanbreez rare earth deposit following an approval from the government of Greenland.

With that latest government support, Critical Minerals added an additional 50.5% stake to its ownership, reportedly acquired from Rimbal Pty Ltd, per Bloomberg News. With access to eight heavy rare earth elements often used in consumer electronics and defense, the site is one of the world’s largest undeveloped rare earth deposits and a key source of rare earth supply outside of China, according to the company.

In Critical Metals’ press release, Chairman Tony Sage commented that the approval “removes the most significant structural overhang on the project and provides the clarity to advance Tanbreez to production with confidence,” especially as Tanbreez’s location offers a significant logistical advantage through its year-round direct shipping access, compared to rival projects.

With 92.5% of the project now vested in Critical Metals Corp., and the remainder owned by European Lithium Ltd., CRML now has full control of the project and is seeking to accelerate development there, with plans for a new international airport and a 150-tonne bulk sample program, which is slated for June 2026.

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