Meta Shareholders Overwhelmingly Reject Proposal to Consider Bitcoin Treasury Strategy

Meta (META) shareholders have overwhelmingly voted against a proposal to add bitcoin BTC to the company’s balance sheet, according to a May 28 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Just 3.92 million votes supported the measure, while nearly 5 billion were cast in opposition. The idea was put forward in January by Ethan Peck, a bitcoin advocate who works as the bitcoin director for the wealth management firm Strive. Peck’s proposal called for Meta to move a portion of its $72 billion in cash and cash equivalents into bitcoin as a hedge against inflation. He argued that the tech giant should treat bitcoin as a strategic reserve asset, similar to a corporate war chest designed to weather monetary policy uncertainty. The campaign was not limited to Meta. Peck also targeted Microsoft (MSFT) and Amazon (AMZN) with similar proposals, filed on behalf of the conservative think tank National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR). Microsoft shareholders recently voted against the plan. Amazon has not yet held a vote. Though Meta doesn’t hold crypto on its balance sheet, the company has dabbled in blockchain before. In 2019, it announced Libra, a global stablecoin project backed by a basket of fiat currencies. That effort collapsed in 2022 after regulatory backlash and internal struggles, rebranding briefly as Diem before being shut down. Meta’s broader crypto strategy remains unclear. While its metaverse ambitions prompted the 2021 rebrand from Facebook to Meta, the company has pulled back on that vision in recent months. Still, earlier this year, reports surfaced that Meta was exploring the use of stablecoins to manage payments across its family of apps. Shares of the company were up 3.5% on Monday, trading at $670.09 a piece.