Crypto Is Cool Again! (proceeds to sell the news)

Bitcoin ETFs are officially here, but the market isn't surprised

Author

Adam Hardej
January 12, 2024

Welcome back venture nerds and happy Friday to those who celebrate!

Big week for Bitcoin from a regulatory perspective. Now apparently Circle, the big stablecoin issuer, is going public? Meanwhile, Discord is laying off 17% of employees. Big thank you to the 200+ of you who attended the “Carta and the future of liquidity” event yesterday and don’t forget to RSVP to the Demo Day!

Bitcoin ETFs begin trading on U.S. exchanges

“Even given the heavy trading volumes and swings in bitcoin, there appeared to be no major problems with the ETFs in their first day.”

After a hiccup on Tuesday from the SEC, Bitcoin ETFs were finally approved Wednesday afternoon and started trading this Thursday. Both Grayscale and IShares ETF saw tens of millions of dollars of volume today, while crypto investors celebrated the long-awaited approval. Bitcoin is down 5%

USDC stablecoin issuer Circle confidentially files for IPO

“In 2021, Circle agreed to go public through a merger with a Special Purpose Acquisition Company named Concord Acquisition Corp., but that arrangement later fizzled out.”

Crypto seemed to have one hell of a Thursday on the public markets. Just hours after recently approved Bitcoin ETFs started trading, one of the biggest stablecoin issuers, Circle filed for an IPO. Back in 2022 when they originally planned for an IPO the valuation was $9 billion. Investors are unaware of current valuation.

Discord is laying off 17 percent of employees

“Citron said Discord grew its headcount too fast over the last few years — an admission that has become quite common among tech CEOs as of late.”

A theme all too common over the last year in large tech startups; a CEO realizing they over hired in the past few years. Discord 5x’ed it’s headcount since 2020, and as with most tech companies over the past year, they realized that this uptick resulted in decreased productivity and higher operating costs.

Hot Links

Demo Days Are Back!

Tune in on January 25th at 3pm EST to watch 5 exciting founders present what they’re building to a great group of panelists and a live virtual audience.

Want to present? Apply here! (fundraising not required)

[Recording] Carta and the Future of Liquidity

Awesome event with a great group of panelists! If you missed the live event you can check out full recording on Twitter here or on LinkedIn here. We’ll also share some key takeaways and clips early next week.

We discussed what happened with Carta and what the future of private markets liquidity will look like. ​We were joined by an incredible group of panelists with deep knowledge of both Carta and the secondary market:

Arjun Sethi is the co-founder and Chief Investment Officer at Tribe Capital. He's an investor in Carta and has served on their board since 2017.

​Hari Raghavan was previously COO at Forge and he wrote one of the most widely shared breakdowns of the recent Carta situation. Hari is also GP at The Autopilot Fund.

​Javier Avalos is the co-founder and CEO of Caplight which is an active secondary trading platform. He previously served as SVP of Marketplace at Forge.

​This event was brought to you in partnership with Sacra.

Friday feeling.

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Talk soon,
Adam

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