The setup: a 15% preferred that may trade above its $100 stated amount
Bitcoin Magazine published an analysis of Strive’s newly IPO’d SATS perpetual preferred stock, arguing that the security could create an unusual financing opportunity if it trades above its $100 stated amount. The article’s main point is that Strive may be able to issue preferred equity above that level and increase Net Bitcoin Per Share, or Net BPS, in each issuance round, subject to the risks and parameters described in the piece.
The key question, according to the article, is whether SATS will trade above $100. The author says that outcome is plausible because SATS carries an unusually high 15% fixed dividend.
SATS pays a fixed annual dividend of $15 per share, based on its $100 stated amount and 15% rate. It ranks junior to Strive’s SATA preferred stock, but the article says its dividend structure offers two features that may appeal to investors. First, SATS dividends are cumulative. Strive can defer payments, but any unpaid dividends accumulate as an obligation to preferred shareholders. Second, the $15 annual dividend is fixed. The article contrasts that with SATA, which currently pays an annualized $13 per share but uses a variable dividend rate, meaning SATA holders could receive less income in the future if Strive cuts that rate.
SATS dividends accrue at a fixed $15 per share per year, but they are payable only when, as and if declared by Strive’s board, and they may be deferred. The article says those terms could make SATS attractive to investors looking for predictable long-term income.
Why the article says SATS could trade above par
To frame the argument, the piece compares SATS with Strategy’s STRD, described as the company’s juniormost preferred. STRD currently trades around $71 per share, or 29% below its $100 stated amount. With a fixed $10 annual dividend, that price implies an effective yield of 14%.
STRD dividends are non-cumulative, which means Strategy can skip payments without creating an obligation to repay those amounts later. The article also acknowledges that Strategy has much stronger bitcoin asset coverage supporting STRD than Strive has supporting SATS. It says STRD’s 4.7x BTC Rating represents twice as much asset coverage as SATA, Strive’s most senior instrument.
Even so, the author argues that many income investors may care more about dividend reliability than coverage ratios. Because SATS offers cumulative dividends and a meaningfully higher stated yield, the article says there is a reasonable case for the market to price SATS at an effective yield below STRD’s. In the example used in the piece, if investors bid SATS to a 13% effective yield, the market price would reach $115.38.
The Net BPS math behind an above-par issuance
That leads to what the article presents as the financing opportunity. If SATS trades at $115 and Strive issues another 1 million shares through an at-the-market offering, the company would raise $115 million in gross proceeds and use the money to buy bitcoin.
Under the author’s Net BPS methodology, however, preferred stock is deducted at its $100 notional amount. On that basis, the new shares would create only $100 million in additional preferred claims. The remaining $15 million would flow directly into the calculation of net bitcoin attributable to common shareholders.
Put differently, Strive would be raising $115 of capital for every $100 of preferred notional it creates. The annual dividend would still be $15, which translates into an effective financing cost of 13.04% on the capital raised. The article says Strive could achieve that accretion without issuing additional common shares.
The floating liquidation preference caveat
The article then turns to an important caveat. SATS has a floating liquidation preference that adjusts based on recent market prices. If SATS trades at $115, its liquidation preference can rise toward $115, temporarily increasing the economic claim held by preferred shareholders.
That preference can also reset lower. The formula, the article says, references the previous trading day’s closing price during periods surrounding a new issuance and the average closing price over the preceding 10 trading days, subject to a $100 floor. If SATS later trades at $100 for 10 trading days, its liquidation preference returns to $100.
While SATS remains above par, the higher liquidation preference offsets some or all of the apparent economic accretion. Once the preference resets to $100, the company keeps the extra capital raised above par while the preferred liquidation claim falls back to its stated amount.
The author goes a step further and argues that the exact liquidation preference matters only if the company is going to liquidate, which in practice would mean bankruptcy. If the company goes bankrupt, the article says the preferred stock would almost certainly trade below $100, causing the liquidation preference to return to $100. In that context, the author says it is valid to use $100 per share as the de facto notional value when computing Net BPS.
The piece also notes that Net BPS is defined by Strategy and is not a metric explicitly reported by Strive. It adds that Strive’s prospectus identifies tax risks that may arise if shares are issued above the liquidation preference, including deemed distributions, disqualified preferred stock treatment, and fast-pay stock treatment.
Why the 15% dividend matters
The article says the premium collected in an above-par issuance can become genuine residual asset value for common shareholders under the Net BPS framework. On that basis, the author suggests that one reason Strive set the dividend as high as 15% may have been to improve the odds that SATS trades above par and unlocks the mathematically accretive outcome described in the piece.
Capital cost remains high, and discipline matters
The analysis does not present the structure as costless. It says the strategy depends heavily on SATS’ market price. At $115, Strive would effectively raise capital at about a 13% annual dividend cost. At $100, that cost rises to 15%. At $90, the effective cost climbs to 16.67%, and issuance becomes dilutive under a Net BPS calculation.
Because of that, the article says Strive should be highly disciplined when issuing SATS through an ATM program. Locking in a mid-to-high-teens cost of capital would work well only if bitcoin generates very large returns and volatility drag does not become a major problem.
The 18-month dividend reserve adds another constraint
The piece also says Strive intends to maintain an 18-month dividend reserve equal to $22.50 per SATS share. That creates another capital allocation issue.
Assuming the company keeps 18 months of dividend coverage, it would need to set aside $22.50 for every share sold. If SATS is sold at par, 22.5% of the money raised would have to remain in cash equivalents, leaving 77.5% available for bitcoin purchases. The article says that once this drag is taken into account, the true cost of capital is higher than the effective yield implied by the issuance price.
Those factors, the author writes, need to be managed carefully.
The article’s bottom line
The piece concludes that SATS may become one of the most expensive digital credit instruments on a stated dividend basis while also becoming one of the more attractive financing tools under the Net BPS metric. If investors consistently value SATS at an effective yield below 15%, Strive could issue shares above par, buy additional bitcoin, and generate Net BPS accretion under that methodology. If SATS cannot hold a premium, that setup does not apply.
In the author’s framing, the opportunity sits in the gap between the $100 stated amount and the price income investors are willing to pay for a fixed, cumulative $15 annual dividend. That spread, the article says, could become a valuable source of accretion for ASST shareholders.
Disclosure and disclaimer
The article discloses that Strive, Inc., the issuer of the securities discussed, is a member of Bitcoin For Corporations, or BFC, and pays membership fees to BFC. It also says Strive did not review the article before publication.
The piece was written by Allard Peng and reflects the author’s own opinion. It states that the scenarios, prices, and yields discussed are hypothetical illustrations, not predictions or guarantees. It also says Net Bitcoin Per Share is the author’s methodology, not a Strive-reported metric. Third-party data cited in the article is as of October 21, 2026, from Strategy.com and Strive.com.
The article says it is for informational purposes only and is not investment, legal, or tax advice, or an offer or solicitation to buy or sell any security. SATS stock is offered only through Strive’s prospectus supplement and accompanying prospectus, which investors are told to read, including the risk factors, before investing. It adds that investing in preferred stock and bitcoin-related securities carries substantial risk, including loss of principal and the risk that dividends are not declared or paid.