By Austin Alonzo
Shares of cryptocurrency-exchange operator Bullish surged in their debut on the New York Stock Exchange, more than doubling in value and briefly giving the company a market capitalization above $16 billion.
On Aug. 13, the Cayman Islands-headquartered company, which also owns the crypto news site CoinDesk, priced its initial public offering at $37 per share early Wednesday. By the time trading began at 1 p.m. EST, the price had already shot up to $90 a share.
At its height, shares of Bullish traded for as much as $118, bringing the company’s market capitalization to nearly $92 billion. At the closing bell, the price had fallen to $70.79 a share.
Backed by tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel, and led by former New York Stock Exchange President Tom Farley, Bullish focuses on serving institutional investors and combines decentralized finance protocols with the security of centralized infrastructure. Since its 2021 launch, the company has processed more than $1.25 trillion in total trading volume, according to the prospectus it filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Aug. 4.
In an Aug. 13 interview with CNBC, Farley said previous growth in cryptocurrency investing has been “basically all retail.”
“The institutional wave has begun … and it’s a question of how big it will be,” Farley told CNBC.
Institutional investor interest in Bullish’s offering was strong ahead of its debut. Bullish’s investment prospectus showed that asset management giant BlackRock and Ark Invest, the firm led by Cathie Wood, expressed interest in buying up to $200 million worth of shares.
Michael Hall, co-chief investment officer and founding partner at Nickel Digital Asset Management, said Bullish could be poised to capitalize on increasing institutional interest as well as additional freedom for Americans to invest in alternatives, like crypto, in their 401(k) retirement plan.
“A pure institutional strategy positions Bullish for more stable, recurring revenue than exchanges reliant on retail volumes,” Hall said.
By comparison, Coinbase, a publicly traded cryptocurrency exchange focused on retail investors, was valued at about $84 billion in terms of market capitalization at the close of trading on Wednesday.
The debut follows a run of successful listings from digital asset companies this year. Stablecoin issuer Circle raised more than $1 billion in June. In May, eToro, an Israeli cryptocurrency trading and investing platform, went public with a $5.4 billion valuation.
The debut also reflects broader optimism in the crypto market, buoyed by regulatory developments under the Trump administration, corporate treasury adoption of digital assets, and inflows into cryptocurrency exchange-traded funds.
Bitcoin, the most popular cryptocurrency, has more than doubled in price in the past 12 months. As of about 4 p.m. EST on Aug. 13, Bitcoin was trading for $122,672 per token. On Aug. 13, 2024, it was trading for less than $60,000.
Ethereum, another popular cryptocurrency, has seen similar performance, surging by more than 70 percent in the past 12 months. As of about 4 p.m. EST on Wednesday, Etherum was trading for $4,711 per token. On the same day a year ago, it was trading for about $2,723 per token.
Reuters contributed to this report.
