October’s historic crypto market crash forced a reckoning across leveraged trading, sent prices tumbling, and set the stage for audacious institutional dip-buying. Among the biggest actors was Tom Lee’s Bitmine Immersion Technologies. The behemoth Ethereum treasury company rapidly expanded its already massive ETH coffers by acquiring 128,718 more ETH (worth about $480 million) immediately after the sharp sell-off.
Bitmine buys the dip
According to real-time data shared by on-chain analytics firm Lookonchain, Bitmine moved quickly in the wake of the plunge. It withdrew over 128,000 ETH from major exchanges FalconX and Kraken using six newly activated wallets likely tied to Bitmine.
These transfers were corroborated by blockchain explorers and were part of a pattern of large withdrawals and positioning by institutional whale accounts through the crash window.
Bitmine is led by Fundstrat Capital CIO Tom Lee and had previously accumulated over 2.83 million ETH. With the latest haul, their holdings jumped to roughly 2.96 million ETH, nearly 2.5% of the entire Ethereum supply; by far the largest ETH treasury of any public company, second only to MicroStrategy in crypto overall.
The market context
The buying spree unfolded just after President Trump’s surprise 100% tariff announcement on Chinese software imports, alongside strict controls on U.S. rare earth mineral exports.
The announcement triggered a cascade: Bitcoin dropped as much as 13%, Ethereum collapsed by 20% and the overall derivatives market wiped out more than $20 billion in open interest in hours. Altcoins suffered steep declines, making deep liquidity pockets and confident buyers rare, except for Bitmine, which reloaded during the chaos.
Transaction logs show Bitmine’s purchases clustered around the crash, with ETH bought at levels as low as $3,728. The acquisition coincided with active positions from institutional whales and some OTC players, with Lookonchain reporting additional multimillion-dollar accumulations at market lows.
There was also a flurry of speculation online about BlackRock timing the market crash and scooping up 45,000 BTC. However, these claims are not supported by public data.
Market impact and looking ahead
Bitmine’s continued accumulation despite posting floating unrealized losses of over $2 billion due to price declines shows institutional conviction in both Ethereum’s long-term value and network fundamentals. As KOL and investor Ted Pillows commented:
“Institutions are not scared to buy Ethereum.”
Their treasury strategy is built for scale. Bitmine remains committed to aggressive “buy-the-dip” maneuvers through moments of heightened volatility. Recent buys also facilitate staking, with Bitmine using validator nodes and liquidity protocols to earn annual yields on top of price exposure.
As leveraged sellers were washed out, Bitmine and similar buyers repositioned for long-term gains, potentially supporting price stability as lower volatility returns post-crash.
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