Bitmine (BMNR), the largest Ethereum treasury company, continued its ether ($ETH) purchases last week as Chairman Tom Lee pointed to ether ($ETH) outperforming bitcoin $BTC$65,052.41 as evidence the crypto market is regaining momentum.
The company bought 9,946 $ETH, worth about $19.4 million at current prices, up from 7,430 $ETH the previous week, according to a Monday update. The purchase lifted Bitmine's holdings to 5,787,414 $ETH ($11.2 billion), or about 4.8% of ether’s circulating supply.
Lee said Bitmine also increased its share repurchases, buying back 6.1 million shares, compared with 5.5 million a week earlier, under its $4 billion buyback authorization.
The latest purchase remains well below the company's buying pace earlier this year, when Bitmine routinely acquired tens of thousands of $ETH each week. Even so, the company has continued adding to its treasury every week since launching the strategy in June 2025 and now owns roughly 4.8% of Ethereum's total supply, putting it within reach of its long-term goal of accumulating 5%.
Ether relative strength
The company's optimistic outlook stems in part from the recent strength of $ETH relative to $BTC, a metric traders often use to gauge risk appetite within crypto markets.
"We view the rising $ETH/$BTC ratio, despite the falling odds of passage of the CLARITY Act in 2026, as a sign crypto prices are strengthening," Lee said. "In fact, this ratio is now at a three-month high at 0.3000, which we believe bodes well for future strengthening of $ETH prices."
Lee also pointed to thereum's recent price recovery as another sign that sentiment may be improving. $ETH hit a 10-week high on Monday, he said, adding that the next technical levels to watch are $2,000 and $2,500.
Ether has been one of the strongest-performing asset in the CoinDesk 20 index over the past month, advancing roughly 24%, outperforming bitcoin’s 8% gain, CoinDesk data shows.