TLDR
- Citigroup raised its price target on Strategy (MSTR) to $240 from $136, keeping its Buy rating.
- The new target implies roughly 50% upside from MSTR’s October 1 close of $160.50.
- Citi lifted its 12-month Bitcoin forecast to $113,000 from $82,000, citing steadier ETF inflows.
- MSTR shares rose 2.7% in pre-market trading Friday following the news.
- Strategy’s Bitcoin holdings stood at 847,666 BTC as of September 27, worth far more than its $63.95 billion purchase cost.
Strategy (MSTR) stock climbed 2.7% in pre-market trading on Friday. The move came after Citigroup raised its price target on the company to $240 from $136.
Citigroup kept its Buy rating in place. The bank’s new target implies roughly 50% upside from MSTR’s October 1 closing price of $160.50.
The revision wasn’t random. It followed Citi’s decision to lift its own 12-month Bitcoin forecast to $113,000 from $82,000.
Citi also raised its ether forecast to $3,028 from $2,240. The bank pointed to stronger crypto activity and a steadier pace of ETF inflows as reasons for the shift.
How Citi Built the New Target
Citi’s math breaks down into two parts. About 34% of the upside comes from the higher expected Bitcoin price. Another 16% comes from an expected expansion in Strategy’s multiple to net asset value, known as mNAV.
The bank raised its Bitcoin Yield Multiple assumption to 4.0 times from 2.5 times. That pushed the implied mNAV to 1.24 times, up from 1.065 times.
Citi noted that mNAV has actually ranged between 1.25 and 1.50 times over the past year whenever Bitcoin held above $85,000 to $90,000. Still, the bank chose a more cautious figure because of Strategy’s growing cash reserve, which it called dilutive to per-share Bitcoin exposure.
This isn’t the first swing on this target. Citi had cut it to $136 from $260 earlier in 2026 after lowering its Bitcoin outlook. Friday’s move reverses part of that earlier cut.
What’s Driving the Bitcoin Rebound
The crypto market itself has had a strong run. Bitcoin is up nearly 40% over the past three months, while ether has gained about 68%, according to CoinGecko data.
That rally has narrowed both coins’ year-to-date losses to around 4% and 9%, respectively. A softer U.S. dollar, following a Treasury buyback of longer-dated bonds, has added some tailwind too.
U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs had seen roughly $5.7 billion in net outflows as of mid-July. Those flows have since turned positive, and Citi expects about $5 billion more in net inflows over the next 12 months.
Not everything on the policy side went smoothly. The Senate failed to advance the Clarity Act, which narrowed the near-term path for market-structure legislation.
But follow-up rule announcements from the SEC softened some of that negative sentiment. It was a wash, more or less, for now.
On the company side, Strategy keeps buying. Its September 28 Form 8-K shows it purchased 1,665 BTC between September 21 and 27 at an average price of $85,681.
Those purchases were funded through Class A stock sales. The company’s total holdings now sit at 847,666 BTC, acquired for $63.95 billion at an average cost of $75,437.
The same filing listed a USD Reserve near $5.02 billion and $1.00 billion in cash. Strategy has also kept repurchasing its variable-rate preferred shares using ATM proceeds.
Earlier in the month, the company bought 950 BTC for $75.7 million using existing cash rather than new stock. That brought holdings to 846,000 Bitcoin at the time.
With Bitcoin trading near $86,000 in early October, Strategy’s current holdings are worth more than their total purchase cost on the books.
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