Public companies holding ether are increasingly relying on staking income as losses mount and investor premiums shrink. Everstake’s study suggests the digital asset treasury model is moving away from simple crypto exposure and toward active yield generation.
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Key Takeaways:
- Everstake found that $ETH treasury firms lost $1.41B as crypto market cap fell 30.6%.
- Sharplink and Bit Digital relied on staking, which made up 60% of reported revenue.
- Everstake says $ETH firms now need DeFi, MEV, and staking yields to stay competitive.
Staking Drives 60% of Revenue for $ETH Treasury Companies
Publicly listed ether treasury companies are facing a tougher market, and staking is emerging as one of the few reliable sources of revenue, according to a new study by Everstake and shared with Bitcoin.com News.
The staking provider reviewed annual reports, quarterly filings, earnings releases and other public disclosures from 15 companies with ethereum treasury strategies. Among firms in the group that had fiscal 2025 results available and reported net losses, combined losses reached about $1.41 billion.
The pressure did not stop there. Bitmine Immersion Technologies reported a separate $9.02 billion net loss for the six months ended Feb. 28, 2026, even after posting net income of $348.6 million for its fiscal 2025 year.
The results come during a weaker period for digital assets. Everstake noted that the total crypto market capitalization fell about 30.6% over seven months, sliding from $3.69 trillion to $2.56 trillion.
Yet the study also found a clear split inside the sector. Companies that actively deployed their $ETH generated far more meaningful operating revenue than those that simply held tokens.
Across the six firms that separately disclosed staking-related figures, staking accounted for an average of 60% of total reported revenue. Those companies were Bitmine, Sharplink, Bit Digital, Forum Markets, BTCS, and FG Nexus.
Sharplink reported a $734.6 million net loss on $28.1 million in revenue. Bit Digital posted an $80.3 million loss on $113.6 million in revenue. BTCS recorded a $33.4 million loss on $16.5 million in revenue.
Still, staking helped offset some of the damage. Bit Digital reported $7 million in $ETH staking rewards for 2025, up 287% from the prior year. Sharplink reported $25.6 million in staking revenue, while Forum Markets disclosed $6.5 million.
The findings point to a broader repricing of digital asset treasury (DAT) companies. Everstake said the 283 largest DAT firms hold a combined $118.3 billion in underlying assets, with an aggregate premium of 17.7%. But many individual DAT stocks now trade below the value of their crypto holdings.
That marks a shift from earlier market cycles, when public crypto treasury companies were among the few regulated routes for equity investors seeking digital asset exposure. Spot bitcoin and ether ETFs have changed that equation by offering simpler and often cheaper access.
Bohdan Opryshko, Everstake’s co-founder and CEO, said the market is rewarding deployed assets over idle balances.
DATs that rely on passive exposure are being structurally repriced, while those that actively deploy capital are setting the new standard. That deployment is no longer limited to standard protocol staking. It includes liquid staking, integration into DeFi lending markets, optimized block construction, and MEV capture.
Everstake’s conclusion is blunt: size alone is no longer enough. For $ETH treasury companies, the next test is not how much ether they hold, but how efficiently they put it to work.
