[Digital Today reporter Jinju Hong] Strategy, known for its bitcoin investment strategy, has overtaken BlackRock to become the largest holder of bitcoin. But despite aggressive buying, bitcoin has fallen to a three-week low, adding to market unease.

Cryptopolitan, a blockchain-focused media outlet, reported on Tuesday local time that Strategy recently bought an additional 24,869 bitcoin at an average purchase price of $80,985. That lifted its total holdings to 843,738 bitcoin.

That put Strategy ahead of BlackRock's spot bitcoin ETF IBIT, which is estimated to hold about 811,000 to 817,000 bitcoin, making it the institution with the most bitcoin. The purchase details were also confirmed in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing.

Strategy has bought a total of 171,238 bitcoin so far this year. That far exceeds the roughly 62,000 bitcoin mined globally over the same period. Over the past week alone, the company's purchases were shown to be more than 10 times new mining output.

Mark Palmer of StoneX Group assessed that "Strategy is leading a significant portion of the bitcoin accumulation trend centered on corporations and ETFs this year."

Still, the market showed little strong reaction to the large-scale buying. Bitcoin fell 4 to 6 percent intraday to as low as $76,593 and later traded below $77,000.

Some in the market say concerns that high U.S. interest rates will persist are limiting bitcoin's upside. The Federal Reserve is still maintaining a tightening stance, and the core personal consumption expenditures price index has been slow to fall from around 2.9 percent.

The U.S. Treasury market also weighed. The 30-year yield rose to 5.18 percent, the highest level since 2007, and the 10-year yield held near 4.6 percent. In general, higher long-term Treasury yields weaken appetite for risk assets, increasing downward pressure on bitcoin.

Institutional outflows are also adding to the burden. Spot bitcoin ETFs posted weekly net outflows of $1 billion as of the May 17 close, ending a six-week run of inflows. Spot bitcoin ETFs saw $331 million leave in a single day, and recent cumulative outflows were tallied at about $2 billion.

Min Jung (민 정), an analyst at Presto Research, said, "ETF outflows show short-term risk-off moves by institutional investors." Jung added, "As expectations for rate cuts have weakened, investors are moving into cash and safe-haven assets."

Bitcoin is now showing some stability slightly above $77,000, but the market is still watching the $74,000 area as a key support level. Analysts assessed that while the recent price correction has rattled retail investor sentiment, the fundamentals of the bitcoin network itself remain solid.

Whether it rebounds will ultimately depend on macroeconomic variables, according to the analysis. The market sees that U.S. 10-year Treasury yields need to fall to around 3.75 to 4.0 percent for dollar strength pressures to ease and for the likelihood of funds flowing back into risk assets to increase.

Accordingly, some assess that for bitcoin to break out of its current range-bound, news-sensitive trading, it will need a shift in the macro environment such as a slowdown in U.S. inflation indicators or an easing in the rise in Treasury yields.