Bhutan’s Bitcoin Holdings of 13,000 BTC: Twice the Amount Held by El Salvador

• Blockchain analysts from Arkham have revealed that Bhutan owns nearly $800 million in Bitcoin through its fully owned subsidiary, Druk Holdings.
• This makes it a bigger BTC owner than the famed El Salvador, and unlike the Caribbean nation, Bhutan doesn’t buy its crypto, it mines it.

Bhutan, a tiny mountainous nation in South Asia, owns twice as much Bitcoin as El Salvador, a country known almost exclusively for its BTC links.

Bhutan grabbed the headlines in the crypto world when it started investing in Bitcoin mining through Druk Holdings, a wholly owned investment vehicle controlled by the country’s Ministry of Finance. While other nations have refrained from BTC—with some like Germany dumping billions of dollars worth of the token—Bhutan has ramped up its investments, and according to Arkham Intelligence, it’s paying dividends.

Arkham, an on-chain analytics platform, revealed that Bhutan now owns 13,036 BTC, worth $773 million at the token’s current price. In the last 24 hours, this stash has gained $11 million as the price of BTC recovered slightly. The country also owns $1.52 million in ETH. For context, the country’s GDP stands at $2.768 billion, making its BTC holdings over 25% of its GDP.

BREAKING: BHUTAN GOVERNMENT’S $750M BTC NOW ON ARKHAM

Bhutan’s Bitcoin holdings are now labeled on Arkham. These holdings come from Bitcoin mining operations carried out by the Kingdom of Bhutan’s investment arm, Druk Holdings.

Arkham is the first to publicly identify these… pic.twitter.com/a8ScUNJJ9F

— Arkham (@ArkhamIntel) September 16, 2024

With this amount, Bhutan is now twice as big a Bitcoin owner as El Salvador. This Caribbean island nation burst into the limelight when President Nayib Bukele made BTC legal tender. Subsequently, the country has been spending millions of dollars every other month to acquire more BTC, which Bukele always announces on social media. According to Arkham, El Salvador only owns $348 million worth of crypto, less than half of Bhutan’s amount.

The on-chain analytics firm further revealed that according to its data, Bhutan is now only bettered by four other governments in BTC ownership. However, unlike the other three, and dozens others, the Asian nation hasn’t acquired its tokens by seizing and freezing from criminals.

The US, for instance, is believed to own about 213,000 BTC, worth about $12 billion at current prices. China is second with 190,000, while the UK has 61,000. While this is an incredible achievement, it’s worth noting that these governments have never invested in the token. Instead, they have acquired all their crypto by seizing it from criminals.

For them, BTC is just another asset that they intend to sell for fiat to finance their public services (although if Donald Trump wins, the direction for the US might shift significantly). Germany is a great example: the European economic giant has dumped nearly $3 billion worth of BTC into the market this year, dealing a significant blow to its price and destabilizing the market.

However, for Bhutan, Bitcoin represents something bigger than a rainy-day fund. Through Druk Holdings, the country has invested in mining and is partnering with Bitdeer, the company led by Jihan Wu, ex-Bitmain CEO and founder.

In April, the two revealed that they would be investing at least $500 million to upgrade their mining farms, with the plan being to ramp up the capacity by 500 megawatts by early next year.