Mm.
Well, we saw Bitcoin soar past the 124,000 level before pulling back, and this was fueled by surging institutions as well as corporate treasury demand, rallying 50% over the past month, trading, well above 4700 in midweek trade.
And as more companies explore crypto treasury strategies, the shine may be fading.
For some of the early hype, but a decline in market net asset value, or MNAV across the sector is raising questions about just how sustainable these digital asset plays really are.
Now micro strategy or strategies, Michael Saylor set the modern template with positive MNA and a Bitcoin heavy treasury strategy, but not every company.
Can replicate that success.
Joining me to weigh in this morning is Chris Perkins, president of Coin Fund.
Chris, great to have you here.
Thank you so much for joining me.
Hey Remy, thanks for having me back on.
Well, we've been hearing a lot about how companies are putting crypto on their balance sheet, but tell us what you make of this and which ones will succeed and which will fail.
This is a really exciting time because it's part of what I like to call a ketchup trade.
These markets were suppressed for 4 years under the previous administration.
And now what we're seeing is actually what it should have been like all along, right?
Companies should be allowed to innovate, and the digital asset phenomenon is really exciting because it's really true convergence.
These are going to end up being some of the largest pools of crypto capital in the world, and what they do is they make it accessible to normal people, right, because you could just go into your brokerage account and you can buy a stock, for example, but it also unlocks the capital markets.
You can borrow and lend with securities and do anything else that any other equity can do.
So it's going to be a huge part of market structure and it also plays into some really interesting structural demand that's coming to crypto.
We saw the president allow now 401k buyers coming into the space.
So you've got buyers coming in there.
You have the DAs buying, and then you have this thing called stablecoins post genius with $3 trillion coming in.
And so there's a lot of structural buying, I think, in the space.
And so I don't think we're, I think we're at the beginning of the cycle.
Yeah, and Chris, we're here on Wall Street at the New York Stock Exchange, and when we think about the recent IPOs, including Circle as well as Bullish yesterday, there's a lot of activity around crypto, and you mentioned Washington DC, the nation's capital, so a lot has changed when it comes to regulatory clarity, but a lot of work still needs to be done.
So what do Paying attention to when it comes to legislation, right?
So these IPOs like bullish yesterday, congratulations to Tom.
He's a friend.
This is the way it should have been all along, and I think sometimes we step back and we're like, wait a second, is this OK?
Our capital markets exist for a reason.
IPOs are a part of them and we are part of the greatest capital markets in the world, so this is how it should be.
A lot of that is because of the legislative and the regulatory derisking that we're seeing.
I will tell you that our regulators right now, the SEC, has been incredible.
They're engaging.
They're asking questions.
They're trying to get it right.
And so we had genius behind us.
That's again bringing trillions of dollars of stablecoins into our space.
It's going to perpetuate the dollar as the global reserve currency for generations.
And next we're going to look at clarity.
Now I think there's some some challenges right now with the CFTC.
We're going to have to get that leadership sorted, but Going forward, once we have that clarity, it's going to even further legitimize de-risk the crypto industry, and I think it's another very bullish indicator.
And speaking of bullish, at least for the crypto majors, we're not just paying attention to Bitcoin as it cleared the all-time highs, but also, and it is a 3 week here in New York City and I know that you spoke on the panel on the first day.
So give us an idea of what's driving price action.
It comes to.
Yeah, Eth is a very exciting asset.
It's been around for over 10 years to at its birthday.
It's never gone down once, and I think when you think about the institutionalization of crypto, institutions like Ethereum because it's modular.
You can, you can create different modules and controls via layer 2s as we call them.
And it also has a yield.
It has a native yield, you know, we've worked to help standardize that yield through a benchmark we call Cesar, but this is going to underpin a next generation of fixed income markets.
And so Ethereum is a really a truly institutional asset, it's being de-risked in the Trump administration.
And I think it has a long way to go.
I mean, there's there's a reason why you're seeing really exciting datas whether it's Ezilla, Bitine with Tom Lee, you know, we talked about Andrew Keys, Ether machine, and SET.
Like there's a reason why these are having success because they can really leverage the yield and then of course all the Defi behind it where you can generate real revenue as a dad.
Yeah, and Chris, finally, before I let you go, I'd love to dive into all these topics that we're talking about, but I do want to get your take on some of the conversations that you're having with stakeholders over at Coin Fund.
So heading into 2025, we're talking about innovation that will come on the heels of regulatory clarity as well as legislation.
So what do you expect?
I mean, we're excited about everything structurally as we're seeing this convergence theme happen with the DAs.
We're also seeing capital coming into our system, but we're also seeing developers coming back in.
And so the innovation that we're seeing across the intersection of AI and crypto as an example is a really exciting theme, but we're seeing that innovation across Defi and everything else.
Going back to stable coins, these things don't pay yield, and so people are going to sit around and tolerate that.
They're going to go into D5 and they're going to look for that yield, and then they're going to say, Well, wait a second, I'm not really good at this.
Why don't I just ask an agent to do it for me and that's where we operate at that.
Section between AIDI crypto.
It's a very exciting time.
Yeah, and Chris, we have about 60 seconds left here.
So for viewers at the nation's airport gates that are watching this right now and they're asking themselves what does all of this mean for my investments?
What would you say to them?
I think it's a very exciting time to be in crypto.
Remember, this asset is still young.
It's still going through this period of maturity.
If you have a long term focus, it's a very good time to look carefully at this as an asset class, do your research, but now there are many easier ways to access it where you don't have to figure out.
And eventually I encourage people to do that, like learn, learn the technology.
Learn how to do it yourself, but in the interim there's wonderful ways to get exposure to this asset class through ETFs, DAs, or other vehicles.
So definitely do your own research.
There's certainly a lot of opportunity out there and good luck.
Well, education is key for crypto, just as for all other investments.
So thank you so much, Chris, for weighing in and thank you so much for sharing your insights.
Always great to be on.
Thank you so much you.
