A Utah-based telehealth company that bet big on Bitcoin is now fighting to keep its Nasdaq listing.
KindlyMD’s dramatic transformation from healthcare provider to crypto treasury holder looked brilliant
during the bull run—but today, with its stock trading below a dollar and unrealized losses piling up,
the strategy is being put to the test.
The Healthcare Company That Became a Bitcoin Whale
Back in May, KindlyMD was just another small telehealth operation. Then it merged with Bitcoin-focused
Nakamoto and everything changed. The deal was billed as groundbreaking: a regulated healthcare business
paired with a massive Bitcoin treasury. To fund it, the company raised over seven hundred million dollars
through private placements and convertible notes—almost all of it earmarked for buying bitcoin.
In August, they made their move. A single purchase of 5,764 BTC at an average price above one hundred
eighteen thousand dollars per coin. It was an aggressive bet that briefly made KindlyMD one of the top
thirty public companies in terms of Bitcoin holdings. But timing is everything in crypto, and the market
had other plans.
Today, that Bitcoin stash is worth around five hundred two million dollars—still substantial, but carrying
an unrealized loss of roughly one hundred seventy-six million dollars. The “new whale” headlines have faded,
replaced by harder questions about whether mixing healthcare and volatile digital assets was wise.
The company’s financials tell the story. Third-quarter results showed just four hundred thousand dollars
in healthcare revenue against operating costs of nearly eleven million dollars. Merger expenses, custody
fees, and those painful digital-asset writedowns added up fast. The bottom line? An eighty-six million
dollar net loss—the kind of number that makes investors nervous, especially when your stock is sliding.
The One-Dollar Problem and What Comes Next
On December 12th, KindlyMD received the notice every public company dreads. Its stock, trading under
ticker NAKA, had closed below one dollar for thirty consecutive sessions. That violates Nasdaq’s
minimum bid price rule, and while it’s not an immediate death sentence, the clock is now ticking.
The company has until June 8th, 2026—a 180-day grace period—to get its share price back above one dollar
for at least ten straight trading days. During this window, NAKA will keep trading on the Nasdaq Global
Market, but management knows they need to act.
They’ve got three main options. The first is the best-case scenario: organic recovery. If Bitcoin rallies
past their purchase price or if the healthcare side starts generating real revenue, the stock could climb
naturally. It’s possible, but it requires both market cooperation and operational execution—neither of which
is guaranteed.
Second, they could move the listing to Nasdaq’s Capital Market, where requirements are slightly more lenient.
It’s a step down in prestige but keeps them listed. The third option is a reverse stock split—essentially
combining shares to mechanically boost the price. It solves the compliance problem on paper, but investors
tend to see reverse splits as a red flag. History shows they often lead to more selling pressure, not less.
None of these paths is easy. Shareholders who’ve already watched the stock fall are understandably skeptical
about dilutive financing and the wild swings that come with holding Bitcoin on a corporate balance sheet.
The company’s next moves will either rebuild confidence or confirm fears that this experiment was mistimed
from the start.
A Cautionary Tale for Crypto-Equity Hybrids
KindlyMD isn’t alone in this struggle. Across the market, companies that reinvented themselves as Bitcoin
treasuries during the bull run are now underperforming the very asset they bet on. Strategy Inc.—formerly
known as MicroStrategy—is dealing with its own challenges around index inclusion. Smaller players that jumped
on the digital-asset bandwagon are trading at steep discounts to the value of the tokens they hold.
November saw the lowest monthly inflows into publicly traded digital-asset treasury stocks all year. Investors
are clearly rethinking the risk-reward calculus. Regulatory uncertainty hasn’t helped, and neither have
tightening financial conditions. What looked like visionary strategy six months ago now looks like a gamble
that may not pay off.
For KindlyMD, the path forward depends on tough choices. They could double down on healthcare operations,
actually building revenue that justifies investor attention beyond the Bitcoin holdings. They could diversify
the treasury—adding cash-flow-generating assets or hedges to balance out the volatility. Or they could simply
hope for a Bitcoin rally strong enough to erase those losses and lift the stock price naturally.
Whatever they choose, the countdown is real and public. By June, we’ll know whether this merger of healthcare
and crypto was ahead of its time or simply poorly timed. For now, KindlyMD stands as a vivid reminder that in
markets—especially crypto markets—conviction alone isn’t enough. You need execution, timing, and sometimes just
plain luck.
