- MicroStrategy founder Michael Saylor will give up the role of CEO as of August 8.
- The upcoming move comes after the software company posted a Q2 impairment charge of $917 million related to its investment in bitcoin.
- Saylor will focus more on the company's bitcoin strategy in the newly created Executive Chairman position.
MicroStrategy's founder Michael Saylor will step down as CEO, with the move coming after the enterprise software maker took a quarterly impairment charge of more than $900 million related to the drop in the price of bitcoin.
Saylor will take on the newly created role of executive chairman and will remain as chairman, the company said in a statement late Tuesday that accompanied its second-quarter results.
"As Executive Chairman I will be able to focus more on our bitcoin acquisition strategy and related bitcoin advocacy initiatives," Saylor said in the statement, noting the roles of chairman and CEO will be split.
MicroStrategy's President Phong Le was appointed as CEO and "will be empowered" to manage overall corporate operations, said Saylor, who founded MicroStrategy in 1989.
The changes – which will go into effect on August 8 – arrive as the company said its second-quarter results in part reflect a digital asset impairment charge of $917.8 million. The charge stems from MicroStrategy's investment in bitcoin, the price of which has plunged this year after setting an all-time high above $68,000 in November.
Bitcoin traded at around $23,385 on Wednesday, with the wider cryptocurrency market caught up in a so-called crypto winter that's pulled its value from $3 trillion to about $1.1 trillion in roughly nine months.
Saylor has repeatedly said MicroStrategy would continue to buy bitcoin and has said he considers the crypto asset as the best store of value.
MicroStrategy posted a second-quarter net loss of $1.062 billion, or $94.01 a share, widening from $299.3 million, or $30.71 a share a year ago. Its second-quarter loss from operations was $918.1 million, compared with $414.2 million in the year-earlier period.