Bhutan’s 10,000-BTC Plan Backs $1B Push to Build Gelephu Mindfulness City

Bhutan has announced a bold sovereign Bitcoin commitment, pledging up to 10,000 BTC—roughly $1 billion at current prices—to support the development of Gelephu Mindfulness City (GMC), a planned economic hub in the country’s south.

In a National Day address, King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck framed the initiative as a people-first development model, saying every Bhutanese citizen will be a stakeholder and beneficiary of the city’s growth. Under a new land policy, GMC will be structured like a company, with landowners effectively treated as shareholders—extending participation beyond the region to citizens across all districts.

The Bitcoin allocation ranks among the largest sovereign uses of digital assets for infrastructure development. Rather than liquidating its holdings, Bhutan intends to preserve the BTC as long-term capital while exploring structured approaches to generate value for GMC. Options under consideration include collateralization, conservative yield strategies, and treasury management frameworks designed to protect and grow the reserve over time.

Oversight, transparency, and long-term stewardship will guide how the digital assets are managed, reinforcing Bhutan’s cautious but forward-looking approach to crypto.

The pledge builds on the kingdom’s multi-year embrace of blockchain technology. Bhutan has previously mined Bitcoin using hydroelectric power and has steadily expanded its digital asset strategy. It currently holds nearly 6,000 BTC, placing it among the world’s top sovereign Bitcoin holders.

This year, GMC designated Bitcoin, Ethereum, and BNB as strategic reserves, enabled crypto payments for tourism through a partnership with Binance Pay, and integrated its national digital identity system with Ethereum—making Bhutan the first country to anchor population-scale identity infrastructure on a public blockchain.

Most recently, GMC launched TER, a gold-backed digital token on Solana, signaling that Bhutan’s vision for Gelephu Mindfulness City blends digital innovation with traditional principles of sustainability, transparency, and long-term value creation.