As the Bitcoin treasury trend becomes increasingly saturated, a new corporate strategy is emerging: allocating funds to altcoins.

The latest company to join this movement is Interactive Strength Inc. (Nasdaq: TRNR), a high-end exercise equipment manufacturer based in Austin, Texas.

As the Bitcoin treasury trend becomes increasingly saturated, a new corporate strategy is emerging: allocating funds to altcoins.

The latest company to join this movement is Interactive Strength Inc (NASDAQ:TRNR), a high-end exercise equipment manufacturer based in Austin, Texas. This morning, the company announced a headline-grabbing move — a “$500 million facility to acquire AI-focused $FET tokens,” according to its press release. The funding comes from private equity firm ATW Partners and crypto market maker DWF Labs.

Fetch.ai (FET) is the native token of the Artificial Superintelligence Alliance, a blockchain-based network of AI agents positioning itself as a competitor to platforms like ChatGPT, Anthropic, and Gemini. Despite its ambitions, FET has struggled recently — it’s down 50% over the past six months, making it the worst-performing token among those adopted for corporate treasury use.

One industry analyst, speaking on condition of anonymity, compared FET to another controversial token. “FET is the XRP of decentralized AI in the sense that it’s latched onto the meme of AI progress. Maybe not as successfully as XRP has with the ‘future of finance’ narrative, but the meme effect is real. It has some capital and a few functioning compute-related projects—but ultimately, there’s not much substance behind it.”

On top of that, the $500 million figure in Interactive Strength’s announcement is also a bit of smoke and mirrors.

(TradingView)

Interactive Weakness

In the announcement, Interactive Strength CEO Trent Ward said, “As a global leader in crypto investments and market making, we see enormous potential in TRNR’s treasury strategy and Fetch.ai’s vision, signaling the next wave of corporate capital markets embracing AI-driven digital assets.” In further marketing materials on its website, the company points out that it sees synergies between its wellness and exercise business and AI. “Unlike traditional AI models that only generate content, these agents are designed for real-world action – personalizing workouts, predicting maintenance, optimizing data flow, and even enabling token-based incentives for healthier behavior,” it reads.

He’ll need that optimism to pay off. Interactive Strength’s stock has plummeted 71.10% over the past six months and 99.82% over the past year.

According to its most recent annual report filed with the SEC, the company posted a net loss of $34.9 million in 2024 and had just $3.9 million in revenue. However, this was an improvement from its performance in 2023, when it produced a $51.3 million loss and had revenue of just $574,000. The company is boasting about a brighter future for its business, outside of the new crypto treasury strategy, based on a couple of acquisitions that are expected to close in 2025. In an updated investor presentation from May, it claims to be on track for $75 million in revenue, and that it will be profitable by Q4 of this year.

(TradingView)

$500 Million—or Just the Illusion of It?

It’s likely due to this precarious financial position that Interactive Strength is ceding some of its agency, or autonomy, in this most recent deal. In what appears to be a first for a crypto treasury arrangement, the company has agreed to a clause allowing each of the two investors to “require the Borrowers to issue additional senior secured convertible exchangeable notes, up to an aggregate principal amount of an additional $444,444,445.” The strike price for each conversion will come at a 20% premium to the official Nasdaq closing price on the day prior to the closing of the note.

In practical terms, that means the much-publicized $500 million deal is actually a $55,555,555 investment upfront, with the remaining $444 million structured as an optional extension — not a guaranteed infusion of capital.

While this is not necessarily a negative deal for the company — after all, the investors would likely only exercise the clause if the crypto treasury strategy is working — it appears to be a significant reflection of the imbalanced power dynamics between the various entities. “We welcome our investor’s continued strategy to invest capital at a 20% premium to market, supporting our vision to acquire $FET tokens and signals the next wave of corporate capital markets embracing AI-driven digital assets,” Interactive Strength CEO Trent Ward wrote via email. “We are open to further convertible debt issuances when they create value for shareholders and fuel our growth.”

In fact, it is difficult to look at deals like this and not be reminded of a trend during crypto’s initial coin offering (ICO) era, when it also became popular for companies to add the word ‘blockchain’ to their