Coinbase Now Has More Institutions Than Retail Volume, Bullish? (Feb. 26, 2021)

Good morning. Welcome to Friday Focus, part of our new series: BitPinas Daily. We will look at the price of Bitcoin, Ethereum and the major cryptocurrencies. Crypto is global, but sometimes news that matters happens while we sleep. So we bring to you what’s happening in our space here and abroad.   

Market Price as of February 26, 2021:

Bitcoin closed February 25, 2021, at $47,058 per BTC. We’re down 18% in the last 7 days and up 61% since the year began. This is also 19% below the all-time high of $58,640, which was hit on Feb. 21, 2021.

Bitcoin’s market capitalization stands today at $878,076,623,032 which is 59.94% of the entire cryptocurrency market. The entire crypto market, by the way, now has a market cap of $1,447,134,058,551 (-7%).

On the table above, there’s the cryptocurrency SLP. If you wonder what that is, check out this article: Playing Axie Infinity vs Minimum Basic Salary in the Philippines.

Coinbase

35% Retail, 65% Institutions make Up Coinbase’s Volume By Customer Segment

Coinbase had released its S-1 registration statement filing with the U.S. SEC, detailing its business and plans. Here are just some of the information that stands out:

• Ticker Symbol will be ‘COIN’
• It had $1.1 billion in net revenue in 2020 
• $482.9 million net revenue in 2019

So important are the following two charts that implies retail participation in Coinbase has decreased compared to institutional participation.(Charts are from The Block)

If it wasn’t clear above, here’s the other chart showing retail vs institutional participation:

The company intends to go public and get listed on the NASDAQ this year.

Coinbase Risks

DeFi, Satoshi’s Unmasking Identified as Risks fo Coinbase

Everytime a company wants to go public, it also needs to tell the SEC what are the risks to its business. Coinbase identified the following:

• The identification of Satoshi Nakamoto. Last year around May, the markets were rattled when some very old Bitcoins moved for the first time. Some analysts said it could possibly be Satoshi’s. 
• Negative perception of Bitcoin or Ethereum. It cited the unpredictability of the coverage of cryptocurrencies in mass media and social media.
• Decentralized Finance. “We compete against a growing number of decentralized and noncustodial platforms and our business may be adversely affected if we fail to compete effectively against them.”
• Company’s revenue is dependent on the volatile prices of Bitcoin
• Potential security breaches and future litigation.

Beeple

Beeple’s Digital Art Now at $2.2 million in Christie’s

Beeple, a very popular digital artist, has received a bid of around $2.2 million in an auction at Christie’s, an art auction house in New York. There’s two more weeks of bidding to go. 

What’s on sale is Everydays: The First 5000 Days, which is a collection of 5,000 pieces that Beeple produced every single day since May 2007. Christie’s call it one of the most unique bodies of work to emerge in the history of digital art. This is the first time a non-fungible token (NFT) art is sold at Christie’s. 

More information here. 

MicroStrategy

Michael Saylor Wants More Bitcoin

“We will continue to pursue our strategy of acquiring bitcoin with excess cash and we may from time to time, subject to market conditions, issue debt or equity securities in capital raising transactions with the objective of using the proceeds to purchase additional bitcoin,” said Microstrategy CEO Michael Saylor.

This is just after investing $1 billion more in Bitcoin. MicroStrategy is the public company with the largest Bitcoin holdings as of the moment.

What else is happening

• Venezuela’s Maduro Says He’s Planning a Digital Currency ‘Surprise’
• 1inch announces expansion to Binance Smart Chain, plans to run BSC node
• Jim Cramer thinks GameStop should convert its stores into crypto info centers
• FATF Says It Is Open to Amending Crypto Travel Rule Guidance

This article is published on BitPinas: Coinbase Now Has More Institutions Than Retail Customers, Bullish? (Feb. 26, 2021)