Nic Carter of Castle Island Ventures argues that most Bitcoin treasury companies offer investors little they cannot get from a spot Bitcoin ETF. Treasury stocks traded at discounts of approximately 40% to net asset value in early 2026, which suggests the market sees the same weakness.
Nic Carter, a general partner at Castle Island Ventures, argued in an October 27, 2026 interview that most Bitcoin treasury firms give investors little beyond what a spot Bitcoin ETF already delivers.
Why Carter sees the corporate wrapper as a cost
Bitcoin treasury firms, also called digital asset treasury (DAT) companies, are public companies that hold Bitcoin as a core part of their corporate strategy. Their pitch to shareholders is Bitcoin exposure plus something extra.
Carter's critique targets that extra. He argues that for most of these firms, it is hard to find.
An ETF holds the asset and tracks it. Buying a treasury company's stock also means buying its management team, capital decisions, debt and corporate overhead.
Discounts point the same way
The market appears to have reached a similar conclusion. Bitcoin treasury and DAT companies traded at discounts of approximately 40% to net asset value in early 2026.
Crypto Briefing reads a persistent discount as a sign that investors see the corporate wrapper as a cost rather than a benefit. That fits Carter's view that the wrapper often contributes little.
Carter is not the only skeptic. Zac Prince, whom the source connects to Galaxy Digital, has questioned the yield-generation strategies some treasury firms use to justify their premiums, and he has drawn parallels to past Bitcoin yield schemes.
How spot ETFs changed the comparison
Michael Saylor's MicroStrategy, now known as Strategy and traded as MSTR, is the template for the sector. Its approach inspired a wave of imitators.
Before ETFs, some investors bought treasury stocks because they were one of the few easy ways to get Bitcoin exposure in a regular brokerage account. Once ETFs filled that gap, the treasury firms lost a big part of their original appeal.
The source says smaller copycats with modest Bitcoin holdings and no distinctive strategy look most exposed to the ETF comparison. The largest players may be better positioned to argue that scale and track record justify their structure.
Source: Crypto Briefing
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