Microsoft Shareholders Push for Bitcoin Investment. Will Stock’s Price Benefit?

The shareholders of Microsoft, a United States-based tech company, will decide by the end of the year whether the firm should publicly consider adding Bitcoin (BTC) to its balance sheet.

According to a recent filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), a proposal titled “Assessment of Investing in Bitcoin” will be voted on at Microsoft’s shareholder meeting scheduled for December 10.

Under U.S. securities regulations, shareholders who hold a specific amount of equity can introduce proposals for consideration at shareholder meetings. These can range from changes in corporate policies to strategic business actions. Ultimately, decisions on these proposals are made through a majority vote by shareholders rather than the board.

Growing Adoption of BTC

The proposal submitted by the National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR) cited MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin investment strategy as a reference. NCPPR highlighted that MicroStrategy’s stock has increased by over 300% this year compared to Microsoft’s, attributing the growth to MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin investment strategy.

MicroStrategy has consistently invested in Bitcoin, making it the largest corporate holder in cryptocurrency. The company started buying Bitcoin to protect its treasury from inflation and aims to accumulate as much BTC as possible.

The research firm NCPPR argued that institutional and corporate adoption of BTC has grown, with spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) becoming more common. They believe that Bitcoin could help protect against inflation and low corporate bond yields, urging companies to look into the benefits of holding a small percentage, like 1%, of their assets in BTC.

It is worth noting that Microsoft is no stranger to the crypto market. From 2014 to 2018, the tech giant accepted BTC payments for purchases on its Xbox online store. If the company embraces BTC in the same fashion as MicroStrategy, it would mean a big deal for the Bitcoin blockchain, considering that Microsoft is currently the third-largest tech firm in the U.S. by market capitalization, with a value of $3.157 trillion.

Microsoft’s Service Outage

Reports show that Microsoft focuses more on artificial intelligence than on blockchain technology. Three months ago, the company’s outage affected many sectors, including TV stations, airports, banks, and emergency services. According to a July report, the outage indicates the need for a more reliable system, such as the decentralized structure of the Bitcoin network, which is designed to resist failures.

Public data from Google Finance shows that Microsoft’s stock price (MSFT) rose 0.03% to $424.70, while BTC traded at $68,500, reflecting a 3.04% increase over the past 24 hours, according to on-chain data.