Cryptocurrency companies stockpiling tokens could evolve from speculative rappers to long-term economic engines for blockchain, arguing Ryan Watkins, co-founder of synchronous capital.
Digital Asset Treasury (DAT) companies are public companies that raise capital to acquire and manage crypto on their balance sheets.
In a blog post on September 23rd and accompanying thread for X, Watkins said that Dats already holds around $105 billion in assets across Bitcoin, Ether and other majors.
His central argument: A small number of these companies could mature into durable operators who help fund, govern and build within the networks held by tokens.
Beyond speculation
Watkins said that most attention is paid to the net asset value, funding announcements and the premiums of “What’s Next Token” that are missing out on the bigger arc.
“I imagine some data becoming a for-profit foundation and working with the crypto foundation, but there is a broader obligation to deploy capital, run the business and participate in governance,” he writes.
Some data already controls meaningful slices of token supply, so those Treasury can be more than a safe. They become policy and product levers within the ecosystem.
He pointed to examples of code origins where scale is important. About Solana, RPC providers, and even more Sols can improve transaction landings and spread captures. With high lipids, increasing hype can increase take rates without lowering users’ fees or increasing costs.
Access to a large, permanent pool of native assets allows such businesses to help bootstrap and scale, he said.
Programmable Money, Productive Balance Sheet
Watkins contrasted these plays with MicroStrategy’s Bitcoin-only strategy. This is primarily about capital structures with regard to non-programmable assets.
He went on to say that by comparison, the tokens for smart contract platforms (ETH, SOL, hype) are programmable and can work with chains.
The data that holds them can build interests for fees, supply liquidity, lend, participate in governance, acquire “ecological primitives” such as validators, RPC nodes, indexers, and turn the Treasury into a yield generation balance sheet.
Structurally, he likened the winning hybrid of a closed-end fund and REIT permanent capital, bank balance sheet orientation, Berkshire Hathaway’s compound interest spirit: familiar model.
What makes them clear is that revenues are generated not through management fees, but rather crypto per share, and approaches pure play on the underlying network than traditional asset managers.
He argued that tools such as general equity, convertibles and priorities provide flexible funding to expand the balance sheet, while on-chain yields help manage that funding over time.
Winner – Risk
Watkins warned that “not all data makes it.”
He expects many first-generation vehicles (light to heavy operating substances for financial engineering) to fade as conditions normalize. As competition intensifies, he predicts experiments with integration, more exotic funding, and reckless balance sheets move when premiums turn into discounts and pressure builds.
In his view, survivors combine disciplined capital allocation with manipulation chops, recycle cash flows into token accumulation, combining product construction and ecosystem expansion. “Over time, the best managed ones could evolve into their blockchain Berkshire Hathaways,” he writes.