Ethereum Foundation sells 5,000 ether to Tom Lee's BitMine in $10.2 million deal

The Ethereum Foundation (EF) said it finalized the sale of 5,000 ether ($ETH) in an over-the-counter transaction with one of the top crypto treasury firm Bitmine Immersion Technologies.

The sale cleared at an average price of $2,042.96 per $ETH, the Foundation said, placing the transaction’s value at roughly $10.2 million.

The non-profit organization, established in 2014 to support the Ethereum blockchain and its ecosystem, said the funds will support its core operations, including protocol research and development, ecosystem growth, and community grants.

The transactions, it said, are in line with the policy that governs its reserve management. The framework aims to strike a balance between holding $ETH and maintaining sufficient fiat or fiat-like assets to cover operating costs. EF currently aims to keep annual operating expenses near 15% of treasury value with a 2.5-year operating buffer, a strategy that determines how often it sells $ETH.

The sale comes less than a month after the Ethereum Foundation began staking up to 70,000 $ETH to support its operations and deepen its role in the Ethereum ecosystem.

Bitmine, helmed by Fundstrat's Tom Lee, was the counterparty in the deal and is the largest publicly traded ether treasury firm, currently holding around 4.53 million $ETH, worth more than $9.4 billion.

The firm’s portfolio is almost entirely ether. The company also holds around 195 BTC and more than $1 billion in cash, along with equity stakes. These stakes also include a share of Beast Industries, the company behind YouTube creator MrBeast, after a $200 million investment in it, along with a 7% stake in the worldcoin treasury firm Eightco.

Read more: 'Mini crypto winter' nearly over, says Tom Lee as Bitmine ramps up pace of ether acquisition