Shareholders Challenge Pay at Crypto Treasury Firms

NEWS / Crypto

Investors Turn Up Pressure On Pay At Crypto Treasury Firms After Rough Year

Kalbir Talwar
Published Sep 17, 2026
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Summary:

• Shareholders are challenging compensation at crypto-asset holding companies after roughly $50 billion in investor losses.
• SkyAI and Metaplanet faced fresh blowback last week over equity awards and warrants tied to insiders and employees.
• Artemis estimates crypto treasury stocks tied to Bitcoin and Ether total about $90 billion in fully diluted value, around 40% below their peak.

What is driving the scrutiny

Investors who chased last year’s crypto run are now licking their wounds and speaking up. Retail and institutional holders are leaning into activism at companies built around stockpiling tokens after losses swelled to about $50 billion.

These firms, often called digital-asset treasuries, keep Bitcoin and Ether as core holdings. Artemis puts the combined fully diluted value of listed players focused on those two coins at roughly $90 billion, around 40% under the high. The tally leaves out companies dedicated to smaller tokens.

The slump tracks the broader market. Bitcoin is about 40% off its record above $126,000 set on Oct. 6, slid hard in the days after, and hasn’t recovered. It was near $76,400 Friday in Asia. No surprise that many of these stocks trade well below the value of the coins they hold.

Ben Schiffrin, Better Markets’ director of securities policy, said, “Executives whose strategy is to invest in risky cryptoassets with no real utility should not be rewarded when that strategy inevitably fails.”

SkyAI’s turmoil and takeover fight

SkyAI Inc., previously Sharps Technology, raised more than $400 million from major crypto funds last year to pivot into a Solana treasury vehicle targeting the seventh-largest cryptocurrency. Since that deal closed in August 2025, the shares have fallen nearly 90%.

Forward Industries, another Solana accumulator, offered to buy SkyAI in June at a 20% premium, but the attempt didn’t succeed. Last week, Forward urged shareholders to vote against SkyAI’s proposed equity plan at the upcoming annual meeting. The proposal sets aside 7.2% of the equity for 30 staffers – valued near $4 million based on today’s market – and it still requires a vote of the shareholders.

According to a SkyAI spokesperson, the plan sits below the midpoint for similar digital-asset treasuries, and only a portion is earmarked for executives. Both entities belong to James Zhang, the brother of SkyAI Chief Investment Officer Yuwen Zhang.

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“It’s extremely abnormal,” said Forward’s chief investment officer Ryan Navi, adding, “I don’t even know how that makes sense.” SkyAI’s spokesperson stated that the deals underwent board review, were publicly disclosed, and were finalized ahead of the fundraising’s close. Tian Zeng, the CEO of crypto hedge fund Third Eye and a participant in the round, contended the disclosures fell short and said that if the warrants had been made clearer, “no one would have invested.”

Metaplanet’s canceled warrants and social backlash

Tokyo-based Bitcoin accumulator Metaplanet Inc., now 84% below its June 2025 peak, faced a different kind of revolt: online retail investors. The furor centered on an opaque incentive setup that users said enriched executives while diluting everyone else. In response, the company scrapped some $220 million in warrants.

On Friday last week, CEO Simon Gerovich pulled back. “One thing is increasingly clear: we are no longer the company we were when the incentive structure at the center of this dialogue was created,” he posted on X. The company revised the program, including canceling some warrants intended for an employee incentive pool. “We are engaging independent external experts to help create a new compensation program to ensure it appropriately aligns management incentives with long-term shareholder value creation,” Gerovich added. Asked for comment by Bloomberg News, he pointed to his X post.

The bigger picture and why it matters

Nakamoto Inc., David Bailey’s Bitcoin acquisition vehicle, has plunged 99% from last year’s high. In February, the company used shares to acquire two other businesses run by Bailey, and he is broadly seen as the person who persuaded Donald Trump to embrace Bitcoin. Bailey says the buys are part of a broader plan to diversify Nakamoto’s earnings.

Some investors viewed that as an obvious conflict of interest. Short-seller Jim Chanos labeled it on X: “Theater of the Absurd.” A Nakamoto spokesperson declined to comment.

Expect more showdowns. A memo from three Goodwin Procter lawyers, released by Harvard Law School this week, said that weak valuations and skepticism about the DAT business model are fertile ground for activists. “Those pressures create a landscape that shareholder activists may find increasingly attractive,” they wrote.

For your wallet, the message is simple: with these companies, pay packages, warrant overhangs, and insider ties can move the stock just as much as Bitcoin’s price. If you own or are eyeing them, those governance choices can be the difference between the discount to crypto assets closing or widening.

Staying focused on long term goals keeps your financial progress resilient and steady. Our CEO Jaspreet Singh is hosting a FREE live investor workshop, How to Profit From A Dollar That’s Losing its Value, on September 29th. Sign up free to join him live.

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