1. Market Wrap: Bitcoin Near $60K as Coinbase Listing Stirs Fresh Crypto Hype
The listing could spur newbie investors to try cryptocurrencies.
Bitcoin (BTC) trading around $60,120.82 as of 20:00 UTC (4 p.m. ET). Climbing 0.68% over the previous 24 hours.
Bitcoin’s 24-hour range: $59,428.21-$61,219.72
BTC trades between its 10-hour and 50-hour averages on the hourly chart, a sideways signal for market technicians.
Bitcoin surged early Monday to a four-week high of $61,219.72. Analysts said the largest cryptocurrency might have gotten a boost from the hoopla surrounding U.S. exchange giant Coinbase’s coming direct stock listing Wednesday.
In cryptocurrency circles, the “Coinbase effect” is when a digital token gets a price pump after getting listed on the cryptocurrency exchange. But bitcoin might get the benefit of a different type of “Coinbase effect” — if newbie investors, spurred by mainstream press coverage of the stock listing, decide to put money into cryptocurrencies.
“The Coinbase hype within crypto, in terms of valuation and its domino effect on other markets” means Wednesday’s direct listing might become “a key catalyst event,” Singapore-based crypto quant firm QCP Capital wrote Monday on its Telegram channel.
2. Binance Allows Users to Trade Tokenized Stock Tokens Starting With Tesla
Users will be able to purchase as little as one-hundredth of a Tesla share, with prices settled in Binance USD (BUSD).
Cryptocurrency exchange Binance is allowing its users to buy fractions of companies’ shares with a new tokenized stock trading service, starting with Tesla.
The crypto exchange announced Monday the launch of Binance Stock Tokens, zero-commission digital tokens that qualify holders for returns including dividends.
As of 1:35 p.m. UTC (9:35 a.m. ET) April 12, users will be able to buy fractions of actual Tesla shares, which trade at $677 a share at the time of writing.
Users will be able to purchase as little as one-hundredth of a Tesla share, with prices settled in Binance USD (BUSD).
The exchange’s native crypto Binance Coin (BNB) has surged more than 25% in the last 24 hours, reaching an all-time high of $637.44. It is priced at $590.51 at press time. It’s not immediately clear what is driving the price of the coin.
It’s not the first tokenized stock play in crypto land: Terra Labs’ Mirror Protocol went live in December.
But where Mirror uses synthetic stocks (or tokenized representations of actual equities), the Binance product is “backed by a depository portfolio of underlying securities” managed by an investment firm in Germany.
3. Rap Icon Nas Could Net $100M When Coinbase Lists on Nasdaq
Nasir Jones’ QueensBridge Venture Partners invested in 2013. A source familiar with the matter confirmed QueensBridge is still on the Coinbase cap table.
U.S. rapper Nasir Jones (better known by his stage name, Nas) is among the fortunate few to have made early investments in Coinbase, the cryptocurrency exchange expected to reach over $100 billion in valuation when its COIN stock lists on Wednesday.
Jones’ investment firm, QueensBridge Venture Partners, got into Coinbase’s Series B round back in 2013 when it raised $25 million. Around that time Coinbase was valued at about $143 million, according to PitchBook.
The Nas news shows just how far Coinbase’s public listing will ripple across the world of venture capital, with everyone from Wall Street veterans to A-list celebrities all standing to win big when the chips fall this week.
4. Wall Street NFTs? New York Stock Exchange Apparently Has an NFT Strategy
The world’s largest bourse has minted a batch of “first trade” NFTs. Oddly, they’re not for sale, according to a source with knowledge.
The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) minted its first set of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) on Monday with six homages to hot tech stocks that debuted on the world’s largest bourse.
The NFTs memorialize first trade metadata for Unity, Coupang, Snowflake, Spotify, Roblox and DoorDash, according to a blog post by NYSE President Stacey Cunningham. They appear to live atop Crypto.com’s native blockchain.
Crypto.com Chief Marketing Officer Steve Kalifowitz told us the crypto app was not paying NYSE to mint NFTs on its weeks-old platform. “They reached out to us,” he said in a Twitter DM.
With its minting, NYSE eases into a wild world of artists, musicians and tongue-in-cheek opportunists all chasing massive payouts in exchange for their digital collectibles. But NYSE is refusing to capitalize on that market; its NFTs are not for sale.
A representative of NYSE parent company ICE was quick to inform us the exchange was “minting” NFTs, not selling them.
5. Q1 2021 Industry Trends: Institutional Interest in ETH Ramps Up
These three events and two metrics show how ether markets are maturing.
Ether (ETH, +0.32%) (ETH) had an outstanding first quarter in terms of performance, doubling in market capitalization and reaching a new all-time high price. Riding that momentum, ether prices have continued to soar, albeit in smaller daily increments, to reach several new all-time highs of close to $2,100 in recent days.
What is equally noteworthy about ether’s performance this past quarter, outside of its price gains, is the institutional attention the crypto asset seems to be attracting and the market tools that have launched to support its trading as a derivatives product.
On Feb. 8, the world’s largest financial derivatives exchange, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, launched ether futures, opening the door for institutional and accredited investors in the U.S. to take leveraged directional bets on ETH and hedge against spot market positions.
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April 13, 2021
