MicroStrategy, the largest public Bitcoin holder, posted its first profit in nine quarters after claiming a tax gain relating to its massive Bitcoin holdings.
In comparison to a loss a year earlier, the enterprise software maker reported a first-quarter net income of $461 million, or $31.79 per share.
The 72% increase in the price of Bitcoin during the most recent quarter allowed MicroStrategy to essentially lower a reserve tied to earlier significant impairment charges for the cryptocurrency, resulting in a one-time tax gain of $453.2 million.
Michael Saylor, co-founder and executive chairman of MicroStrategy, saw his $4 billion investment in Bitcoin become profitable again as the value of the biggest cryptocurrency surpassed its average purchase price.
Early in April, Bitcoin surpassed $30,000, which is a little more than MicroStrategy's purchase price of $29,803. As a result, the company was able to avoid having to write down the value of its Bitcoin holdings and avoid an impairment charge.
Saylor started buying Bitcoin in 2020 to reduce the amount of cash the company had. According to its financials, MicroStrategy had a total of 140,000 Bitcoin at the end of March. For the quarter, the company added 7,500 Bitcoins for about $179 million.
Bitcoin price action
At the start of May, Bitcoin dipped just below $29,000, continuing a negative trend that had begun on Sunday as federal regulators got ready to seize control of First Republic Bank.
The price of the biggest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, which had fallen nearly 2% in the past day, was currently about $28,168.
After recovering from the prior day's lows of $27,664, Bitcoin has remained roughly at $28,000 as it was revealed that banking behemoth JPMorgan had won the bid to buy First Republic assets.