Gold Explorer Joins Bitcoin Treasury Bandwagon – Decrypt

Hamak Gold, an early-stage mineral exploration company focused on discovering orogenic and greenstone-hosted gold deposits in Liberia, West Africa, is shifting part of its treasury into Bitcoin.

Listed on the London Stock Exchange since 2022, the company announced Thursday that it had raised £2.47 million through a share placement, though it did not specify when the funds were secured.

The “injection of new capital” makes Hamak Gold “well-positioned to pursue two core objectives in parallel,” Nick Thurlow, its newly-appointed chairman, said in a statement published by the London Stock Exchange.

Those objectives include “maximising [our] existing gold exploration and development opportunities” and “seizing the transformative opportunity […] to lead the UK in bitcoin treasury management,” Thurlow said.

While it remains pre-revenue and has no active mining operations, Hamak Gold holds licenses across more than 1,700 square kilometers of prospective terrain.

Same playbook, different players

Bitcoin treasury pivots have become increasingly familiar strategies, particularly among companies seeking to reinvent themselves.

Michael Saylor’s Strategy shifted to Bitcoin in 2020 after years of stagnant performance. Semler Scientific, a healthcare company, faced declining revenue and legal issues before adopting its Bitcoin strategy last year. It now aims to acquire 105,000 BTC by 2027.

Others, such as GameStop, tuned into the trend amid pressure from retail headwinds and activist investors, with its board approving Bitcoin purchases earlier in March. It has since acquired over 4,710 BTC and raised $450 million last month, potentially securing more.

More recent moves include those by Opyl, an Australian biotech firm with less than a month’s runway in cash, and Vanadi Coffee, a Spanish café chain with just six locations, appear to be working from the same playbook: pivot to Bitcoin, reset the narrative.

Structure and discipline

Still, not all Bitcoin treasury strategies are built alike.

The difference, according to Saul Rejwan, managing partner at early-stage crypto venture capital firm Masterkey, comes down to structure and discipline.

Citing Tokyo-listed Metaplanet, Rejwan told Decrypt that the firm “first refinanced high-coupon hotel debt and bought back older secured bonds,” later issuing zero-coupon paper to add 1,005 more Bitcoin.

But because Metaplanet’s operating engine can already cover its liabilities, the Bitcoin position “complements a cleaner balance sheet instead of substituting for one,” Rejwan explained, highlighting how a Bitcoin treasury model could serve as a kind of “litmus test” for businesses.

Rejwan contrasted that with firms like Twenty One Capital, which he characterized as a “SPAC-born” vehicle. Twenty One Capital had announced earlier in April that it plans a public debut already carrying 42,000 BTC on its treasury, which Rejwan noted is “funded largely by fresh equity and convertible debt” from backers such as SoftBank and Tether.

“Here, the share count balloons before a single satoshi is earned; Bitcoin volatility is expected to do the heavy lifting for the stock price, not to protect retained earnings,” Rejwan said, comparing the big players to the newer entrants.

“The dividing line is risk discipline,” he argued. While a bullish market may tend to “flatter” such reserve strategies, history could prove otherwise, he claimed.

Firms that “rely on serial equity raises, oversized positions or one-signer wallets” are ostensibly “levering shareholders to a four-year boom-and-bust cycle,” Rejwan noted.