DATs in 2026: how digital asset treasury companies are holding up
Checking in on 2025's hot meta
This article is adapted from a video essay by Tally CEO & Co-founder, Dennison Bertram. Watch the full video on X.
Digital asset treasury companies were a hot meta in 2025. Now that it’s 2026, it’s worth checking in to see how they’re doing.
DATs are still a big deal in crypto, but performance has cooled off. Many are now trading at a discount to the value of the coins they hold.
What is a DAT?
A DAT is a public company whose main business is to raise capital, whether equity, debt, or convertibles, and use it to buy and hold crypto like Bitcoin or Ether on its balance sheet.
The goal is usually to give shareholders leveraged exposure to the underlying asset and to outperform simply holding the coin, often through active treasury tactics: issuing shares when trading at a premium, using yield strategies, and so on.
For investors who cannot or will not hold tokens or ETFs directly, whether due to mandates, custody, operations, or other reasons, DATs are pitched as a regulated equity wrapper for digital assets.
How are they doing now?
As of late 2025, roughly 200-plus public companies globally have some kind of digital asset treasury strategy, together holding around the low hundreds of billions of dollars in crypto.
However, the DAT trade has struggled. By early 2026, at least 37 of the top 100 Bitcoin treasury companies were trading at a discount to their net asset value. About 40% of them are below NAV overall. In 2025, virtually all major Bitcoin treasury stocks underperformed the S&P 500, and a majority spent more on their Bitcoin than it’s now worth on their books.
The archetype here is the former MicroStrategy, now rebranded as Strategy, which holds about 673,000 Bitcoin, roughly 3% of the eventual Bitcoin supply. The company continues to target aggressive BTC yield and dollar gain KPIs through equity and preferred offerings.
Other large treasuries include firms like Twenty One Capital, Tesla, Block, Coinbase, and Metaplanet. Public companies alone are estimated to hold over one million Bitcoin collectively, about 5% of the supply. Data on corporate holdings is tracked by sites like BitcoinTreasuries.net and CoinGecko.
A newer crop of DATs and Bitcoin standard corporates has broadened beyond BTC into ETH and other majors, with at least one large ETH-heavy treasury accumulating several million ETH by the end of 2025.
Are DATs going to blow up crypto?
DATs concentrate a meaningful chunk of supply, several percent of total Bitcoin plus growing ETH, but this is still a minority versus the broader market, and holdings are spread over many entities.
The real systemic risk is pro-cyclical behavior. If share prices fall and capital markets shut for DATs, they lose the ability to fund new buys. In a severe stress scenario, some could become forced sellers, amplifying drawdowns.
Research notes that the DAT model works best in rising markets with easy capital. In flat or falling markets, persistent NAV discounts, equity dilution fatigue, and debt loads can turn them into a drag instead of a catalyst.
What this means for investors
DATs are basically a levered, actively managed bet on a coin plus equity market and management risk. Spot ETFs, which launched in the US in January 2024, are more like a passive one-to-one wrapper.
In a strong bull market with open equity financing, DATs can outperform the underlying. But investors are exposed to dilution, execution risk, regulation, and the possibility that the stock trades at a discount even when the coin does well.
For someone bullish on crypto and comfortable trading US and global equities, DATs are a high-beta satellite play, not core exposure. Core allocation is usually better done through direct coins or regulated spot ETFs, with DATs as a small speculative overlay if desired.
What to watch in 2026
What happens next is up in the air. If the market rebounds or gets to a healthy spot, DATs could become a better play once again. Right now, the main concern is making sure they don’t become forced sellers.
Tally provides token infrastructure for the most successful teams in crypto. We help teams launch, govern, and operate token-based systems at institutional scale. If you’re interested in launching with Tally, schedule a free sales consultation.