Michael Saylor: The next phase of the crypto industry will be "digital credit"

ChainCatcher news, according to Forbes, Michael Saylor has, over the past six years, transformed Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy) from a corporate software company that was virtually unknown outside the industry into the world’s largest institutional corporate holder of Bitcoin, with cumulative holdings of more than 762,000 BTC, worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

At a digital assets summit held in New York yesterday, Saylor discussed “digital credit” and sees it as a core opportunity. The STRC he introduced (nickname “Stretch”) is a preferred stock product that Strategy positions as a unique tool in the crypto space: an asset designed to be low-volatility with high returns, intended for inclusion in fixed-income investment portfolios. Saylor mentioned that the product has a yield of 11.5%, volatility of around 2%, and a Sharpe ratio close to 4. The product’s notional size is $5 billion, with average daily liquidity of $224 million, and it already has institutional-grade trading scale.

After the event, he said: “Digital credit is the most compelling credit instrument in the world. If you can create a product with a Sharpe ratio of 4, it should be in every portfolio.”

Meanwhile, institutional capital is flowing back into Bitcoin through regulated channels, and U.S. spot ETFs have recorded the longest net inflow streak of the year. However, for wealth managed in the U.S. overall, the share allocated to crypto assets is still below 0.5%—and Saylor is trying to bridge this gap. For investors seeking yield, a tool that uses Bitcoin as collateral, has bond-like volatility, and delivers double-digit returns opens up an entirely new investment narrative.