The digital assets market retreated from all time highs this week.
Bitcoin reached a weekly of $60,116, and re-tested the $60,000 mark after retracing early in the week. However, the price fell below $54,000 on Tuesday, before a brief market rally after Tesla’s news on Wednesday drove it above $57,000 again. Bearish momentum soon returned, with Bitcoin falling to a current value of $52,840. Bitcoin’s market cap dropped below $1tn
Ethereum had a weekly high of $1,865, before falling in tandem with Bitcoin on Monday, dropping to $1,660, rebounding to $1,740, and then experiencing a further dip in line with Bitcoin, to a low of $1,566 and a current value of $1,604
The weekend once again saw the overall market cap of digital assets reach a new all-time high of $1.85tn on Saturday, before the dip led to a current value of $1.65tn
The decline in Ether’s price led to a decreased value locked in decentralised applications; a total of $50.8bn across Bitcoin and Ethereum
Digital assets achieved a new record in overall market cap, before pulling back. Meanwhile, Fidelity filed to launch a Bitcoin ETF, there were reports of a race for exposure to the Korean trading market, Deutsche Bank published new research lauding the impact of network effects on Bitcoin’s value, and listed companies ranging from Tesla in America to Meitu in Hong Kong all declared long-term confidence in the value of this asset class.
News:
What happened: Digital asset ETFs gather pace globally
In Brazil, the Securities & Exchange Commission approve two separate digital asset ETFs this week
One of the ETFs is based purely on Bitcoin, whilst the other involves Bitcoin and five other digital assets, replicating the Nasdaq Crypto Index (NCI), which is rebalanced quarterly
In conjunction with First Trust Advisors, they have filed for the “First Trust SkyBridge Bitcoin ETF Trust”, intending to trade on the NYSE Arca exchange
Scaramucci’s SkyBridge Capital currently holds approximately $600m in Bitcoin, and in an interview this week he encouraged more corporate adoption of the asset, saying increased printing of the US dollar is “a silent tax on American savers… A responsible CFO or responsible treasurer will have to think about other assets to hold as a potential store of value for their companies”
Mike Durbin, the head of Fidelity Institutional, spoke to Reuters this week about digital asset adoption by institutional investors
Fidelity were one of the first mainstream investment firms to offer digital asset custodianship for corporations, back in the crypto winter of 2018, and on Wednesday filed to launch a Bitcoin ETF
Whilst he said that many wealth managers have become savvy and technologically-adept in order to interact with digital assets, he also acknowledged “They know what they are doing, and more importantly their end investor base also knows what they are doing - but the vast majority are still in the education mode”
He also believes that crypto assets are positioned well to take advantage of appetite for alternative investments, claiming; “I think that the growth rate of bitcoin or digital assets will follow in the wake of broader alternative investments. There’s still work to be done there to help advisors understand portfolio construction with these kinds of expressions”
Deutsche Bank published a new research paper this week in the second part of its “The Future of Payments” series, focused on Bitcoin
In light of Bitcoin’s recent ascent above a $1tn market cap, Deutsche Bank declare it “too important to ignore”
According to their research, Bitcoin “is here to stay”, although they note that compared to more traditional assets, liquidity is low; citing 2020 trading volume equal to 150% of Bitcoins in circulation, compared to Apple’s trading volume of 270% of shares in circulation
Deutsche Bank position the Tinkerbell Effect (the economic theory that “the more people believe in something, the more likely it is to happen”) as a possible driver of Bitcoin’s valuation
However, they also recognise that it is more than a speculative asset, quoting Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt; “It is not a speculative investment even though it is being used as such by other people. As Bitcoin network grows, the value of Bitcoin grows. As people move into Bitcoin for payments and receipts, they stop using US Dollars, Euros and Chinese Yuan, which in the long term devalues these currencies”
The report says that Bitcoin is currently viewed as a strong and legitimate store of value, writing “Bitcoin is now another treasury-management tool. Recently, a few publicly traded companies have started converting cash in their treasuries into Bitcoin as an alternative store-of-value. For example, in August 2020, MicroStrategy, a business analytics company, converted $425 million worth of cash in its treasury to Bitcoin”
Deutsche believe that in the long term, Bitcoin’s borderless nature will be a key value proposition, writing that “Bitcoin’s current valuation is pricing in a shift toward cross-border digital currencies; the hypothesis is that Bitcoin, as the leader, will benefit from network effects and become an important means of payment in the future”
After attracting attention in early February with a $1.5bn Bitcoin purchase and pledge to accept the digital asset as payment, Tesla put that pledge into action this week, as well as clarifying the company’s policy with the digital assets collected in payment
He also tweeted that the company’s involvement involved deep infrastructural development, with internal nodes rather third-party solutions; saying “Tesla is using only internal & open source software & operates Bitcoin nodes directly”
According to the business section of Korean newspaper The Korea Times, several global institutions are currently considering the acquisition of Bithumb, South Korea’s largest digital asset exchange
Korean regulations currently only allow citizens wishing to trade in crypto assets to trade on Korea-based exchanges—which could make an ownership stake in major local exchanges crucial to any businesses looking for exposure to a market responsible for 9% of global digital asset trading volume
The Korea Times article cites major companies as potential bidders for Bithumb, including Deutsche Bank, JP Morgan, and Morgan Stanley—although the latter has denied interest since the report was first published
Other potential buyers cited in the article included local tech giant Naver, VISA, an affiliate of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and leading crypto asset exchange Binance
The purchase in question relates to the 10% stake held by majority shareholder, Korean tech company Vidente, before securing the controlling stake through purchase of additional shares
What happened: Institutional Managers are currently holding record amounts of digital assets
How is this significant?
According to a weekly report of inflows by digital asset company CoinShares, institutional investment in digital assets is at record levels
Last week saw a total of $57bn in net inflows to crypto asset investment products, a weekly increase of $99m
Except for XRP, all the major digital assets monitored by CoinShares had positive net inflows
The report also found that demand is increasing in Europe and Canada, with recent Canadian adoption of digital asset ETFs cited as a key driver of demand there
In an interview with the New York Times this week, Miami mayor Francis Suarez repeated his wishes to make Miami a “hub” for digital assets, saying that “Miami will always strive to be ahead of the curve. Expanding the financial freedom of Miamians is the first step towards our modern economy”
Suarez also said he was currently in the process of “refashioning” the city’s image from one of “fun in the sun” to being a serious centre for innovation
As part of these efforts, Suarez convinced organisers of the Bitcoin 2021 conference to move the event from Los Angeles to Miami, with hosts at the MANA Wynwood convention centre noting it was part of the “vision to make Miami a global tech hub”
In other Miami-based digital asset news, the city’s Miami Heat basketball team have become the first major American sports team to ink a stadium sponsorship deal with a digital assets company, the crypto exchange FTX. The naming rights deal will earn the county $90m over 19 years, according to a press release by Miami-Dade county
During a webinar sponsored by the Bank for International Settlements, Fed chairman Jerome Powell spoke out against Bitcoin’s capacity to serve as a currency due to perceived volatility, saying that “It is essentially a substitute for gold rather than the dollar”
Powell is keen to stress the need for new regulatory frameworks when it comes to digital currencies like stablecoins, claiming that the Fed is in “go-slow” mode regarding a digital dollar, claiming “we don’t need to rush this project—we don’t need to be first to market”
It is however not a subject that the Federal Reserve is ignoring, as Powell attests “There is a tremendous amount of thinking going on, on how we can capture the potential benefits while also managing those potential risks”
On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that crypto asset exchange and custodian Blockchain.com has achieved a $5.2bn valuation after securing $300m in a funding raise led by DST Global Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and VY Capital
This represents more than a 70% increase in valuation, compared to a February raise of $120m led by Google Ventures that saw Blockchain.com valued at $3bn
Significantly, the Journal reports that this is the third-largest raise in digital asset history, after mining hardware producer Bitmain raised $400m in 2018 and BlockFi raised $350m last year
The article cites this raise as an evidence that “highlights venture capital’s growing willingness to jump back” into the digital asset space
The WSJ also reports that “Between debt and equity, the company has raised $1.5 billion since its inception in 2011, according to Chief Executive Peter Smith”
What happened: Non-Fungible Tokens continue to see adoption amongst institutions and investors
How is this significant?
After adoption by Sotheby’s and Christie’s in recent weeks, the emerging technology of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) continues to make the news across multiple industries
In South Korea, a social gaming app with more than three million users announced they would be using an environmentally-friendly NFT technology to mint virtual assets linked to video games for their community
A job posting from the Guggenheim museum in New York wants the candidates to evaluate the potential of NFT-based art, which they describe as “ a nascent, fast growing, highly scalable area of the art world”, before asking applicants to help answer the question “How will blockchain and cryptocurrency change how a museum defines its collection strategy?”
Meanwhile, digital asset exchange (and recent sponsor of the Aston Martin Formula 1 team) Crypto.com announced the creation of an invite-only NFT platform “dedicated to delivering unique content from popular artists, musicians, athletes, and sports”, featuring exclusive content from brands like Aston Martin F1, alongside celebrities like Lionel Richie, Boy George, and Snoop Dogg
In an interview on Monday with Morgan Creek Digital partner (and vocal Bitcoin bull) Anthony Pompliano, CNBC’s Mad Money host (and co-founder of TheStreet.com) Jim Kramer spoke about his growing enthusiasm for digital assets compared to gold
Kramer said that “I have, for years, said that you should have gold… but gold let me down. Gold is subject to too many vicissitudes. It’s subject to mining issues. It’s frankly subject to failing in many cases”
As a result of the comparative performance between the asset classes, Kramer is halving his position in gold, amending a decades-long policy and saying “If they listen to me, they’re going to drop half their gold. I’ve been saying 10% in gold since 1983. And now I say 5% in gold, 5% in bitcoin”
Kramer also said that “corporate treasurers should put a percentage of their corporate cash into Bitcoin”
A report from Bloomberg on Monday stated that researchers from the Boston Federal Reserve and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology could unveil a prototype for a digital dollar as early as this summer
The teams have been working together since August last year, and now the Boston Fed’s project lead James Cunha says the team will unveil “at least two platforms capable of moving, storing, and settling digital dollar transactions”
In line with Jerome Powell’s “go-slow” attitude towards digital currencies, Cunha stresses that rather than advocating for a specific approach, they intend to demonstrate proofs of concept and possibilities, adding “We think it’s important that we not wait for the policy debate because then we’ll be a year or so behind”
In a public question-and-answer session hosted on the website Reddit, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong answered numerous questions sound Coinbase’s upcoming public listing and their future plans
In a video response to a question about full integration of crypto payments across the internet, Armstrong touched on stablecoins and Central Bank Digital Currencies, saying “I think central bank digital currencies are going to be really big as well and pretty much every major government out there is starting to think about how they’re going to build them. We are cryptocurrency agnostic, so we will support and cryptocurrency, including CBDC and stablecoins and decentralized ones like DAI as long as they meet our listing standards”
As the largest US-based crypto asset exchange, such a move could potentially extend the reach of CBDCs far beyond their borders
Following the news that Turkish president Erdogan had fired the Turkish central bank’s governor Naci Agbal, the Turkish lira fell 15% against the dollar, leading to increased localised interest in Bitcoin as a currency hedge
According to a report from financial research firm FundStrat, one of the biggest winners of the increase in digital assets has been the institutional crypto mining industry
Share values of listed crypto mining companies have actually outperformed Bitcoin since it reached $20,000, as the infrastructure behind digital assets has grown in value alongside the assets themselves
The report notes that “Because miners play such a critical role in ensuring the Bitcoin network functions properly, investors have sought opportunities to gain exposure to mining companies”
They however also note that the infrastructure likely won’t hold value as well as the assets during future market downturns; “Mining company equities may serve as a high-beta play on Bitcoin… when the market enters a bear cycle, we would expect mining equities to have greater downside volatility than Bitcoin”
Japanese company SBI Holdings announced this week that they are opening up their mining pool services to both institutions and individuals, giving them access to the world’s 11th-largest mining pool
Chinese tech company Meitu purchased $50m worth of Bitcoin and Ether on Thursday, on top of previous purchases this month
In total, Meitu have made $90m worth of investments into digital assets this month
This makes Meitu the first listed Chinese company to make large investments into digital assets, leading some to dub them “the Microstrategy of Asia”
Meitu’s board takes a long-term view on the potential value appreciation of crypto assets, saying in a note to investors that “The Board believes that the blockchain industry is still in its early stage, analogous to the mobile internet industry in circa 2005. Against this backdrop, the Board believes cryptocurrencies have ample room for appreciation in value”