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Michael Saylor
Executive Chairman, MicroStrategy Inc.

Michael Saylor: 'We Tripped Over' the World's Most Efficient Tax-Deferred Income

📅 Jun 13, 2026 CoinDesk 23 MIN 5122 VIEWS 1 SEGMENTS · 1 SPEAKERS
Strategy founder Michael Saylor took the Consensus mainstage to unveil what he calls the killer app for Bitcoin: digital credit. Saylor explained how his company's STRC instrument, now the biggest and most liquid preferred stock in the world after just eight months, strips yield from Bitcoin's volatility to create an 11.5% tax-deferred return with near-zero volatility. He argued that digital credit is the missing bridge between Bitcoin and crypto, TradFi and DeFi, and that it opens the door to a new generation of yield coins that could transform the $350 billion stablecoin market and beyond. -...

What Michael Saylor said

Written from the verified transcript and checked against it. Every figure links to the moment it was said.

Michael Saylor said MicroStrategy's Bitcoin holdings let it create a new credit instrument, STRC, which pays an 11.5% dividend funded by unrealized capital gains, calling it the most efficient tax-deferred fixed income generator. He said Bitcoin's 40% volatility is damped to about 3% for STRC, which has $8.5 billion AUM, $375 million daily liquidity, and trades at par even when Bitcoin dropped 37%. Saylor argued STRC beats money markets (3.5%) and private credit (8.5%), and that its low volatility allows 10x leverage for 95% yield. He positioned digital credit as a bridge between TradFi and DeFi, with yield coins as the next layer, and said the $300 trillion credit market could see 1-10% transformed. He cited rapid DeFi adoption, with sales growing from $1.2 billion in March to $3.2 billion in April, and set a goal of $100 billion AUM for STRC.

Key takeaways

  1. STRC pays an 11.5% dividend, funded by Bitcoin's unrealized capital gains, with volatility reduced from 40% to about 3%.
  2. STRC has $8.5 billion AUM, $375 million daily liquidity, and grew 340% annually, becoming the largest preferred stock in 8 months.
  3. Saylor targets $100 billion AUM for STRC with sub-2% volatility.
  4. Digital credit could transform 1-10% of the $300 trillion global credit market.
  5. STRC sales grew from $1.2 billion in March to $3.2 billion in April, with DeFi partners moving 10x faster than TradFi.

Numbers and commitments

FigureWhat it refers toTypeAt
11.5% STRC dividend yield metric 0:05
$8.5 billion STRC assets under management metric 0:05
$375 million STRC daily liquidity metric 0:05
40% Bitcoin volatility metric 0:05
3% STRC volatility metric 0:05
$100 billion STRC AUM target commitment 0:05
$300 trillion global credit market size metric 0:05
1-10% share of credit market digital credit could transform guidance 0:05
$1.2 billion to $3.2 billion STRC sales growth from March to April metric 0:05
37% Bitcoin price drop in last 6 months metric 0:05
Michael Saylor 0:05 ↗
Thank you for allowing me to speak with you today. I'm going to talk about merging TradFi and DeFi, Bitcoin and crypto merging, and yield coins coming to stable coins. This is my first time at Consensus, so I wanted to wait until I had something interesting to say. I want to talk about digital credit, which is based on digital capital. To create the best credit, you need the best performing asset—Bitcoin has been outperforming the S&P, gold, and Nasdaq. We wondered if we could carve a credit instrument out of Bitcoin. Bitcoin's 40% volatility is too high for most investors, so we use capital gains to fund a credit dividend. For example, from 30% returns we extract 11%, or from 6% real estate we pay 3%. Bitcoin is the highest performing capital, so we can pay the highest dividend. You also need a lot of assets—my company has about $68 billion in capital and an $85 billion enterprise. The killer app for Bitcoin is digital credit: we sell credit into traditional capital markets and offer a yield. For every dollar of capital, we sell about 20 cents of credit per year. MSTR trades more than IBIT and has massive derivative support. To create credit, we strip currency risk, credit risk, duration risk, damp volatility, and distill a yield—like turning crude oil into kerosene. We extract the first 11% and give people stable compounding without massive drawdown. The excess volatility goes to equity, making MSTR amplified Bitcoin and STRC Bitcoin credit. Since August 2020, Bitcoin is up 40%, MSTR up 60%, and STRC is the credit. We straddle both sides: leveraged performance seekers and comfortable yield seekers. STRC offers double-digit returns, tax deferral, low volatility, and capital preservation. If you don't need money for 4 years, buy Bitcoin; if you need it in 4 months, use STRC. Using unrealized capital gains to pay dividends creates tax-deferred return of capital—we inadvertently created the most efficient generator of tax-deferred fixed income. STRC has $375 million daily liquidity, volatility reduced from 40 to 3, $8.5 billion AUM growing 340% a year. It's the biggest and most liquid preferred stock in the world in 8 months. In the last 6 months, Bitcoin dropped 37% while STRC paid 6.4% dividends and held par. In the last 3 months, STRC traded in range 100% of the time. Liquidity grew 7X in 5 months. Money markets pay 3.5%, private credit 8.5%, STRC pays 11.5%—18% tax-equivalent in Miami. It's the risk-free rate in crypto at 11.5%, creating a massive arbitrage opportunity. With 2% vol, you can 10x leverage and capture 95% yield. STRC has the highest Sharpe ratio of any credit instrument, outperforming Nvidia and all hedge fund strategies. It's liquid, zero-fee, transparent, updated every 15 seconds. Digital credit will transform 1-10% of the $300 trillion credit market. STRC is distributed through all retail brokers (Schwab, Robinhood) and is 80% retail. Corporations use it for treasury. It's number two in BlackRock and VanEck credit indexes. The most interesting part: digital credit is the stepping stone to digital money and digital yield. We've converted volatile digital capital into a 3-vol, 11% yielding credit instrument stabilized by $60 billion in equity. Now, at layer three, you can create digital money or yield with programmed volatility, yield, liquidity, and currency. From 3-vol 11% credit, you can step down to 0-vol 5% money or leverage up to 25% yield. The stablecoin market ($350 billion) needs yield. Digital credit competes with treasuries but offers net yield. STRC is over-collateralized with $5 of capital per dollar. We update risk every 15 seconds and publish credit models. Capital flows to superior yield; digital yield backed by STRC beats DeFi yield. DeFi innovators (Apex, Hermetica, Kraken, Ondo, Pendle, etc.) are moving 10X faster than TradFi, reaching $270 million in 8 weeks. Sales grew from $1.2B in March to $3.2B in April. Digital credit bridges Bitcoin and crypto, TradFi and DeFi. Bitcoin is digital capital, STRC is digital credit, and apps can be built on top. Yield coins are 0-vol, 8% yielding, backed by Bitcoin. There's potential to build yield coins in yen or Swiss francs, or 24% yield coins with staking. Our focus is to make STRC a $100 billion AUM instrument with sub-2 vol. We invite you to create hundreds of digital money and yield apps, keep 200-300 basis points, and build proprietary products. This will power the digital assets industry to 10x or 100x development. Thank you.

Cite this transcript

APA, MLA, BibTeX
APA

Saylor, M. (2026, June 13). Michael Saylor: 'We Tripped Over' the World's Most Efficient Tax-Deferred Income [Interview transcript]. CoinDesk. CEOInterviews.AI. https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/982761/

MLA

Michael Saylor. "Michael Saylor: 'We Tripped Over' the World's Most Efficient Tax-Deferred Income." CoinDesk, 13 Jun. 2026. Transcript, CEOInterviews.AI, https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/982761/.

BibTeX
@misc{saylor2026_982761,
  author       = {Michael Saylor},
  title        = {Michael Saylor: 'We Tripped Over' the World's Most Efficient Tax-Deferred Income},
  howpublished = {Interview transcript, CoinDesk. CEOInterviews.AI},
  year         = {2026},
  month        = {jun},
  url          = {https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/982761/},
  note         = {Speaker-attributed transcript with timestamps}
}