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Coinbase jumps on Liquifi acquisition

Coinbase, the largest crypto exchange, announced it acquired token management platform Liquifi, adding to the momentum in the crypto M&A space.

Shares of Coinbase were up 2% at market open.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed in the announcement. 

“Acquiring Liquifi gives us best-in-class capabilities in token cap table management, vesting, and compliance, and positions Coinbase to support builders earlier in their journey,” Greg Tusar, VP of institutional product for Coinbase, said in the announcement.

Tusar added that launching tokens is “too hard,” due to legal, tax, and compliance challenges. “We want to remove these barriers by providing both the product and the expertise to make token launches simple, compliant, and scalable. Our vision is a world where launching a token is easier, faster, and more global than issuing traditional startup equity.”

In May, Coinbase acquired Deribit, the biggest crypto options platform, in a mammoth $2.9 billion deal. This followed its January acquisition of on-chain ads and attribution platform Spindl

“Acquiring Liquifi gives us best-in-class capabilities in token cap table management, vesting, and compliance, and positions Coinbase to support builders earlier in their journey,” Greg Tusar, VP of institutional product for Coinbase, said in the announcement.

Tusar added that launching tokens is “too hard,” due to legal, tax, and compliance challenges. “We want to remove these barriers by providing both the product and the expertise to make token launches simple, compliant, and scalable. Our vision is a world where launching a token is easier, faster, and more global than issuing traditional startup equity.”

In May, Coinbase acquired Deribit, the biggest crypto options platform, in a mammoth $2.9 billion deal. This followed its January acquisition of on-chain ads and attribution platform Spindl

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Altcoin trading activity has lost its mojo

Non-bitcoin cryptocurrencies have seen their trading volume plummet in the past five months. The combined trading volume of ethereum, XRP, solana, dogecoin, SUI, and chainlink has decreased by 60% since crypto’s October 10 liquidation event, according to Thomas Probst, a research analyst at crypto markets data provider Kaiko.

Main Altcoins Trading Volume in USD
The trading volume of ETH, SOL, XRP, DOGE, SUI, and LINK.

For all altcoins, spot trading volume on Binance has declined between 80% and 85% to $7.7 billion, while altcoin volume on other exchanges has dropped to $18.8 billion, down from a range of $63 billion to $91 billion in October, a Friday report from Decrypt found, citing data from CryptoQuant.

“This trend may be explained by a contraction in market liquidity over the same period,” Probst told Sherwood News. “This phenomenon is also reflected in the average 1% market depth, which stood at approximately $2.6 million before the October 10 crash and is now closer to $1.7 million when aggregated across ETH, XRP, SOL, SUI, and LINK.” 

Market depth is used by investors and traders to gauge the scale of liquidity in a market. 1% market depth refers to the amount of liquidity needed to move the market by 1%. 

CoinGlass’s Altcoin Season Index, a measure to assess the performance of non-bitcoin cryptocurrencies, has been sitting above 50 this week, suggesting that the current market is neither in a bitcoin dominant phase nor an altcoin season.

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Payward, parent company of crypto exchange Kraken, puts plans for IPO on hold

Payward, crypto exchange Kraken’s parent company, has paused its plans for an initial public offering until market conditions improve, according to a report from CoinDesk that cited two people with knowledge of the matter. 

Since the firm announced in November its preparation for an IPO of its common stock, the total market capitalization of the crypto industry has shed around $652.2 billion, from $3.2 trillion to $2.5 trillion as of Wednesday, data from CoinGecko shows. 

The news comes two weeks after Kraken received approval for a master account from the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, allowing the crypto exchange to connect to the Fed’s payment infrastructure used by traditional banks and credit unions. 

Last year, Kraken raised $800 million at a $20 billion valuation from institutional investors such as Jane Street and Citadel Securities.

The news comes two weeks after Kraken received approval for a master account from the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, allowing the crypto exchange to connect to the Fed’s payment infrastructure used by traditional banks and credit unions. 

Last year, Kraken raised $800 million at a $20 billion valuation from institutional investors such as Jane Street and Citadel Securities.

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