BitMine Won't Stop Buying Ethereum — Tom Lee Now Eyes 5% Of Total Supply

Add TechGaged as your preferred source on Google

See more TechGaged stories across Google News and Discover.

BitMine has bought ETH every single week since June 2025. Fourteen months later, that streak still hasn’t broken, and the company is closing in on a target few treasury firms have come close to reaching.

What Arkham’s Data Actually Shows

Arkham flagged the latest purchase on August 17. BitMine bought $18.9 million in ETH and another $30.8 million in its own stock, BMNR, over the past week.

BitMine Won't Stop Buying Ethereum — Tom Lee Now Eyes 5% Of Total Supply — *Image Via X.*

That brought the firm’s total Ethereum position to over 4.81% of the token’s entire circulating supply.

The “Alchemy Of 5%” Target Is Almost Here

Tom Lee, BitMine’s chairman, has publicly branded the company’s 5% supply target the “Alchemy of 5%.”

At current holdings, BitMine sits roughly 96% of the way there, leaving only about 226,000 ETH left to buy. The pace hasn’t been perfectly steady though.

BitMine’s ETH purchases slowed to just 7,391 tokens the week before this one, its smallest weekly haul of 2026, as the firm shifted more capital toward buying back its own shares instead.

A Buying Streak That Survived Real Pressure

This accumulation campaign hasn’t happened during calm markets. BitMine added $214 million in ETH back in June during a selloff Lee dismissed as “superficial” at the time.

Techgaged reported in March that the firm’s weekly purchases were already outpacing its own prior averages, pushing total holdings past 4.66 million tokens and roughly 3.86% of Ethereum’s supply.

That steady pace continued even through a stretch in May when Lee himself pointed to rising oil prices and risk-off sentiment as the biggest drag on ETH’s price.

Why Lee Keeps Buying Despite ETH’s Rough Year

Ether has fallen nearly 60% over the past 12 months, yet Lee’s conviction hasn’t visibly shifted.

He’s pointed to the ETH/BTC ratio breaking above a multi-year downtrend as a signal that investors are starting to price in Ethereum’s role in tokenization and agentic AI.

Lee has previously projected ETH could reach $22,000 within a few years, and $62,000 to $250,000 over the longer term, a forecast The Motley Fool noted sits far above where most analysts are willing to go.

Where ETH Sits On The Chart

As of the latest CoinGecko reading on August 18, 2026 (15:30 UTC), Ethereum trades at $1,911.44, up 2.0% over the past 30 days.

Price has climbed from lows near $1,850 in early August back above $1,900, with the current level sitting near the upper half of its 30-day range.

How long it takes BitMine to close that final gap to 5%, and whether Lee’s long-term price targets ever catch up to where ETH actually trades, are two very different questions the market is watching side by side.

Disclaimer:
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or trading advice. The views expressed are based on publicly available data, market observations, and the author’s interpretation at the time of writing. Cryptocurrency markets are highly volatile and unpredictable, and past performance or current technical setups do not guarantee future results. Readers should conduct their own research and consult with a qualified financial advisor before making any investment decisions. TechGaged does not accept liability for any losses incurred based on the information presented.

How do you rate this article?